Copy 


OF THE 


AMERICAN ACADEMY OF 


POLITICAL AND SOCIAL SCIENCE 


Prohibition and Its Enforcement 


Editor in Charge of this Volume 


T. HENRY WALNUT 


Chairman of the Workmen’s Compensation Board of Pennsylvania. Formerly 

Special Assistant U. S. Attorney, Philadelphia 


SOCIAL SECURITY BOARD 


JAN 20 1944 




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Vol. C1X ' 


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^R, 1923 

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No. 198 












THE AMERICAN ACADEMY OF POLITICAL 

AND SOCIAL SCIENCE 

>*% • V' ' ' •: I ^ r '/ ► . .i‘ •"* J ‘ *. r l v . *v . * . ' - • * i 


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Issued bi-monthly by the American Academy of Political and Social Science at Concord, New 
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\AjC-aJ\J qLcsi f t , > 
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, 4*v . 

PROHIBITION 
AND ITS ENFORCEMENT 




.t. a 


®f)e UnttaUs 


Volume CIX September, 1923 

Editor: CLYDE L. KING 
Associate Editor: J. H. WILLITS 
Assistant Editor: J. T. SALTER 

Editorial Council: C. H. CRENNAN, DAVID FRIDAY, A. A. GIESECKE, A. R. HATTON, 
AMOS S. HERSHEY, E. M. HOPKINS, S. S. HUEBNER, CARL KELSEY, J. P. LICH- 
TENBERGER, ROSWELL C. McCREA, E. M. PATTERSON, L. S. ROWE, 

HENRY SUZZALO, T. W. VAN METRE, F. D. WATSON 


Editor in Charge of this Volume 
T. HENRY WALNUT 

Chairman of the Workmen's Compensation Board of Pennsylvania 
Formerly Special Assistant U. S. Attorney, Philadelphia 

With a Supplement: The Business Cycle 

Editor in Charge 
CLYDE L. KING 



The American Academy of Political and Social Science 
39th Street and Woodland Avenue 
Philadelphia 
1923 



Copyright, 1923, by 

The American Academy of Political and Social Science 

All rights reserved 


EUROPEAN AGENTS 

ENGLAND: P. S. King & Son, Ltd., 2 Great Smith Street, Westminster, London, S. W. 
FRANCE: L. Larose, Rue Soufflot, 22, Paris. 

GERMANY: Mayer & Muller, 2 Prinz Louis Ferdinandstrasse, Berlin, N. W. 

ITALY: Giornale Degli Economisti, via Monte Savello, Palazzo Orsini, Rome. 

SPAIN: E. Dossat, 9 Plaza de Santa Ana, Madrid. 


r 


CONTENTS 

a 

PROHIBITION AND ITS ENFORCEMENT 


PAGE 


I. THE PROS AND CONS OF PROHIBITION 

THE RELATIONSHIP OF ALCOHOL TO SOCIETY AND CITIZENSHIP. 1 

Eugene Lyman Fisk, M.D., Medical Director, Life Extension Institute 

PROHIBITION. 15 

Floyd W. Tomkins, D.D., LL.D., Philadelphia 

OUR EXPERIMENT IN NATIONAL PROHIBITION. WHAT PROGRESS HAS IT 

MADE?. 26 

W. H. Stayton, The Association Against The Prohibition Amendment 

THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT—A VIOLATION AND INFRINGEMENT OF 

LIBERTY. 39 

Hon. Henry S. Priest, St. Louis Bar 

WHAT’S WRONG WITH THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT?. 48 

Fabian Franklin, Contributing Editor, The Independent 

INHERENT FRAILTIES OF PROHIBITION. 52 

John Koren, Former President American Statistical Association; Author of “Alcohol and 
Society,” “The Economic Aspects of the Liquor Problem,” Etc. 

STATE RIGHTS AND PROHIBITION. 62 

Henry W. Jessup, LL.B., J.D. 

THE NON-EFFECTIVENESS OF THE VOLSTEAD ACT... 67 

Senator Walter E. Edge, Former Governor of New Jersey, 1917-20 

THE VOLSTEAD ACT. 85 

Hon. George S. Hobart, Former Member of the New Jersey Assembly 

MEN, MACHINERY AND ALCOHOLIC DRINK. 102 

Charles Reitell, University of Pittsburgh 

II. SOME PHASES OF THE EFFECT OF PROHIBITION 

EFFECT OF PROHIBITION FROM THE VIEWPOINT OF AN EMPLOYMENT 

MANAGER. 110 

Eugene J. Benge, Atlantic Refining Company 

NOTES ABOUT PROHIBITION FROM THE BACKGROUND. 121 

Robert A. Woods, Head, South End House, Boston; formerly Member of the Boston 
Licensing Board 

COMMENTS ON PROHIBITION BY A LUMBERMAN AND MINER. 129 

T. D. Stiles, Editor, Penn Central News 

KANSAS AND ITS PROHIBITION ENFORCEMENT. 133 

Alfred G. Hill, Alumni Secretary, University of Kansas; formerly of the Topeka Daibj 
Capital and Philadelphia Public Ledger 

THE CONSUMPTION OF ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES. 137 

Hugh F. Fox, Secretary, United States Brewers’ Association 

LIQUOR IN INTERNATIONAL TRADE. 145 

Wayne B. Wheeler, Anti-Saloon League 

III. PROBLEM OF ENFORCEMENT 

POLITICS IN THE ENFORCEMENT OF THE LIQUOR LAWS. 155 

Hon. Arthur Capper, U. S. Senate 

THE PROHIBITION LAW AND THE POLITICAL MACHINE.... 165 

Imogen B. Oakley, Chairman, Civil Service Division, General Federation of Women’s 
Clubs 

LABORERS IN HEAT AND IN HEAVY INDUSTRIES. 175 

Florence Kelley, General Secretary, National Consumers’ League 

iii 






















IV 


Contents 


THE PRACTICE OF PHARMACY UNDER THE VOLSTEAD ACT. 179 

Ambrose Hunsberger, Ph.M. 

A NATIONAL POLICY FOR ENFORCEMENT OF PROHIBITION. 193 

Felix Frankfurter, Harvard Law School 

THE POLICE OFFICER’S DIFFICULTIES IN ENFORCING LIQUOR LAWS. 196 

Major Lynn G. Adams, Superintendent Pennsylvania State Police, Harrisburg 

THE HUMAN ELEMENT IN PROHIBITION ENFORCEMENT. 201 

T. Henry Walnut, Chairman, Workmen’s Compensation Board of Pennsylvania; formerly 
Special Assistant, U. S. Attorney, Philadelphia 

IV. WORLD STRUGGLE WITH LIQUOR 

WORLD-WIDE PROGRESS TOWARD PROHIBITION LEGISLATION. 208 

Ernest H. Cherrington, General Secretary, World League Against Alcoholism 

PROHIBITION IN CANADA. 225 

Cyril D. Boyce, Moderation League of Ontario, Canada 

PROHIBITORY LEGISLATION IN CANADA. 230 

Ben H. Spence, Dominion Alliance for the Suppression of the Liquor Traffic, Canada 

THE ENGLISH LAW RELATING TO THE SALE OF INTOXICATING LIQUORS. . 265 

Lady Astor 

THE ANTI-SALOON LEAGUE—WHY AND WHAT?.. 279 

Harry M. Chalfant, Editor, American Issue (Pennsylvania Edition) 

AFTERWORD. WHY I BELIEVE IN ENFORCING THE PROHIBITION LAWS.... 284 

Hon. Gifford Pinchot, Governor of Pennsylvania, 1923 


SUPPLEMENT 

I. THE BUSINESS CYCLE 

AMERICAN EXPANSION AND INDUSTRIAL STABILITY. 289 

Henry S. Dennison, President, Dennison Manufacturing Company 

BUSINESS MEN AND THE BUSINESS CYCLE. 291 

C. H. Crennan, Continental and Commercial National Bank, Chicago 

II. MISCELLANEOUS 

GERMANY’S NEW LABOR LEGISLATION. 296 

Emil Frankel, formerly Secretary and Director Research Bureau, Baltimore Federation of 
Clothing Manufacturers 

CANONS OF JOURNALISM. 305 

THE AMERICAN PEACE AWARD.. 307 

BOOK DEPARTMENT. 311 

INDEX. 321 

















The Relationship of Alcohol to Society and to 

Citizenship 

By Eugene Lyman Fisk, M.D. 

Medical Director, Life Extension Institute 


W HAT is citizenship? It can only 
arise when two or more people 
are close enough for their lives to touch. 
A single individual on a desert island or 
otherwise removed from his fellows is 
not a citizen, but an inhabitant. Let 
another individual land on that island 
and a convention must arise and citizen¬ 
ship is called for. This necessarily in¬ 
volves a restriction of personal liberty 
—so called. 

What Is Personal Liberty? 

In the story of creation, Adam is 
merely an inhabitant until Eve appears 
and then Adam becomes a citizen; and 
along with his rib, he loses a consider¬ 
able part of his personal liberty, never 
to be regained by any of his male de¬ 
scendants except Robinson Crusoe. 

Just what is personal liberty? Ab¬ 
solute personal liberty is the right to do 
anything that one has the power or in¬ 
clination to do, regardless of the conse¬ 
quences to one’s self or to others. This 
is not a prerogative of citizenship in a 
free republic. This is a truth that 
needs to be burned into the brains, not 
only of aliens who seek citizenship 
under our Constitution, but of every 
existing citizen who really loves his 
country. 

There is always more personal liberty 
in a despotic monarchy than in a free 
republic, paradoxical as this may seem. 
In a semi-civilized or despotic monarchy 
there is less law, less restraint upon the 
lawless, more license and arbitary ex¬ 
ercise of power than is possible in an 
enlightened and well-governed repub¬ 
lic. In fact, the despot and his satel¬ 


lites and the innumerable little despots 
that flourish in a semi-civilized state 
are examples of the nearest approach to 
personal liberty that exists in human 
society. But even the despot must 
yield to certain conventions, supersti¬ 
tions or traditions, and dare not over¬ 
step certain lines laid down by the 
customs of his people. Many years 
ago Huxley, one of the most ardent ad¬ 
vocates of individual freedom of speech, 
thought and action, wrote: 

It is a necessary condition of social ex¬ 
istence that men should renounce some of 
their freedom of action. There is no coun¬ 
try or nation in which an adult man has 
exclusive possession of himself. In fact, 
the very existence of society depends on the 
fact that every member of it tacitly admits 
that he is not the exclusive possessor of 
himself and that he admits the claim of the 
polity of which he forms a part, to act to 
some extent as his master. 

The Self-Indulgent 

There is much talk in these days of 
personal liberty. Is this cry raised in 
behalf of freemen, of men who stand 
out as types of rugged, independent 
spirits untrammeled by the chains of 
habit, bowing to no petty tyrant such 
as “bracers,” “appetizers,” “pick-me- 
ups,” and other slave-holding indul¬ 
gences? Not so. The cry is raised in 
behalf of a limited section of our popu¬ 
lation, which includes as its core the 
self-indulgent men who really have 
less personal liberty than they who 
are physically free because they are 
healthy, because they are not bound in 
the shackles of some indulgence and 
can dig up out of their inner resources 


2 


1 


2 


The Annals of the American Academy 


and also find in their environment a 
thousand and one means of satisfying 
existence, instead of seeking escape 
from life strain by dulling the mind 
with a narcotic. 

This is an age tending strongly to 
self-indulgence and materialistic stand¬ 
ards; to ideals of power, profit and pa¬ 
ganism. I do not believe that this is 
the intrinsic mental or spiritual in¬ 
clination of the mass of the people, that 
is, of the mass of intelligent people, as 
the votes against alcohol prove; but I 
believe we are struggling with a com¬ 
paratively small group of individuals 
who make a great deal of noise about 
what they insist are the fundamental 
desires of the whole people. For ex¬ 
ample, we are told that rotten plays, 
rotten movie films and rotten books 
are furnished, and rotten social customs 
are established because the whole 
people demand them, while, as a mat¬ 
ter of fact, the average citizen’s gorge 
rises at all these things, only he is too 
good natured and apathetic to protest 
or at least to act against them. He is 
afraid of being regarded as a “softie” 
or lacking in good fellowship. 

1 What an Analysis Showed 

I have spent a good part of my life in 
weighing, measuring and sifting human 
beings, originally for purely business 
purposes—that is, for life insurance. 
There was no sentiment or propaganda 
or emotion in the matter. It was a 
cold-blooded analysis of human impair¬ 
ments and of favorable human traits. 
I have had in my life insurance, life ex¬ 
tension and professional experience 
many of the great men of the world, as 
well as the average type, physically, 
mentally and morally stripped for 
scientific study and analysis. Of re¬ 
cent years it has been my privilege to 
analyze about a quarter of a million 
people for no other purpose than to 
prolong their lives and add to their 


happiness. I have been impressed by 
the degree to which many people drift 
into indulgences and injurious physical 
practices through a slavish following of 
custom, through no fundamental in¬ 
stinctive desire for indulgences or 
practices that are harming them, but 
largely as a matter of imitation. 

With regard to prohibition, it is often 
urged that a minority of the population 
only are in favor of it and that they 
have sand-bagged or stampeded the 
balance of the country into supporting 
this principle. Well, for the sake of 
argument, let us assume that is so. I 
am quite sure that this is not so, be¬ 
cause I once analyzed the applications 
for insurance in two important life 
companies, one of them having a large 
proportion of German policyholders; 
and I was surprised to find in one 
company—that with the German pop¬ 
ulation—64 per cent were total ab¬ 
stainers, and in the other 56 per cent. 
In another company, carrying its re¬ 
cord back sixty years, about 35 per 
cent were practically total abstainers, 
indicating the trend toward temper¬ 
ance. Futliermore, we have the fact 
that the orderly machinery provided by 
the Constitution for registering the will 
of the people has registered against 
alcohol. The contention that the total 
abstainer is a mere crank recruited 
from certain special classes of society, 
such as the clergy and welfare workers, 
was thus shown to be unwarranted by 
an analysis of the total abstainers in an 
important company that had separated 
this class on its books. The figures 

were as follows: 

Clergymen. 4 per cent 

Farmers. 19 “ “ 

Clerks. 15 “ “ 

Miscellaneous (men earning 

from $15 to $25 per week).. 62 “ 

At the Life Extension Institute, a 
recent analysis of 5,000 people, ex- 





Relation of Alcohol to Society and Citizenship 


3 


amined in the course of several months 
at the Head Office in New York, showed 
63 per cent of total abstainers, which is 
consistent with the testimony from in¬ 
surance sources. 

Not a Short Cut to Happiness 

Let us, however, accept the premise 
that a few prohibition spell-binders and 
health cranks have caused a stampede 
to prohibition, and analyze the situa¬ 
tion from that standpoint. Since the 
human race has for ages been sand¬ 
bagged, stampeded and otherwise 
crowded from the breezy uplands of 
health and happiness, which I firmly 
believe it is the inalienable right of man¬ 
kind to occupy, by the ignorant and 
self-indulgent who have set up false 
standards of living, can we complain 
if those who have attained some know¬ 
ledge of healthful and constructive 
standards of living have caused a 
stampede toward these uplands? I 
presume there is no class of people so 
voluble and insistent about the matter 
of being a good sport and giving a 
square deal as this self-indulgent class; 
yet to me the spectacle of this class and 
the sprinkling of high-minded, clean¬ 
living and well-intentioned men who 
are mingling with them in their advo¬ 
cacy of so-called personal liberty, is a 
very distressing one from the stand¬ 
point of a square deal, fair play and 
even an elementary sense of proportion. 

Probably for at least 30,000 years 
society has placed no restraint upon the 
opportunity for drunkenness, let alone 
the opportunity for so-called moderate 
drinking, except Mohammedan coun¬ 
tries where other equally serious evils 
have been permitted and where one 
cannot make comparison as to the 
probable result of such restraint among 
the Occidental races. The human race 
has experimented for many thousands 
of years with alcohol and always with 
the same purpose, no matter how it 


may be disguised as an alleged food 
accessory or a mere thirst-quencher, 
and that purpose is to secure its drug 
effect, to numb the critical faculties 
that enable a human being to appreci¬ 
ate his limitations and the menacing 
factors in his environment. 

This is all there is to the so-called 
stimulating effect of alcohol and to the 
alleged instinct for its use. The in¬ 
stinct is simply to seek a short cut from 
trouble and a short cut to happiness. 
Life would indeed be simple if we 
could attain such ends without work¬ 
ing for them; if its highest prizes could 
be handed to us by a barkeeper for the 
price of a drink. So far as bringing any 
real happiness or offering any real 
solution of man’s individual and social 
problems are concerned, there is abso¬ 
lute proof that alcohol has been carried 
by society as a burden and a liability; 
that it undermines our capacity for 
joyous living. 

A Poor Sport 

I deplore the poor sporting spirit and 
lack of imagination and fairness of any 
man who would not welcome the oppor¬ 
tunity to break the continuity of this 
alcoholic experiment that is an obvious 
failure after 30,000 years, and give a 
trial for at least five or ten years, or, 
what would be far more conclusive, a 
full generation’s length to a denarcot- 
ized world. 

I doubt whether any of the really 
wholesome men who are opposed to 
prohibition would dare to face an 
audience and admit that they could not 
live happily and contentedly without 
alcohol. No doubt there are many 
men in the anti-prohibition group who 
would freely admit that life would lose 
much of its interest without the oppor¬ 
tunity for alcoholic indulgence. Such 
men are, of course, adjusted to the drug 
habit. There are not as many as was 
commonly supposed who are irretrieva- 


4 


The Annals of the American Academy 


bly adjusted to it; and no one who has 
any hope or faith whatever in the des¬ 
tiny of mankind, or in the fitness of this 
world as a place to live in, can afford to 
admit that individual and social con¬ 
tentment cannot exist unless mixed 
with alcohol. The man who is really 
in the grip of alcohol, in a pathological 
sense, may well have our commisera¬ 
tion, our thoughtful earnest care and 
aid; but the man who is merely toying 
with alcohol, who refuses to incommode 
himself temporarily by a non-alcoholic 
existence, when he is confronted by the 
indubitable evidence of the ravages of 
alcohol among weaker brethren, is not 
in my opinion an example of the high¬ 
est type of citizenship. 

Up and Down the Range of Society 

There is a good deal of nonsense 
talked by scientific men, as well as lay¬ 
men, on this subject. We are told that 
none but the fundamentally weak and 
defective take to alcoholic excess. 
Now, human nature is not so simple as 
all that. No one can draw a line of 
demarcation between the defective and 
non-defective, except at the extremes. 
As a matter of fact, we are all defective 
to some degree. Among 250,000 people 
examined by the Life Extension Insti¬ 
tute, we have yet to find a perfect in¬ 
dividual, either mentally or physically. 
The leading men of the world are now 
giving evidence of the incapacity of 
even the highest intellects to function 
always with perfect judgment, always 
with perfect moral poise. The biog¬ 
raphies of the greatest men of history 
are filled with the records of their er¬ 
rors, their faults and their weaknesses. 
Personality is always a mosaic of traits. 

Among the many thousands of men 
that I have personally examined, and 
the many thousands whose records have 
come under my observation, I have 
never found one whom I felt could be 
implicitly trusted with alcohol. In¬ 


stead of having two groups—the de¬ 
fective and non-defective—we have a 
sliding scale, beginning with the high¬ 
est type of humanity, strong in phys¬ 
ical and moral fibre and in resistance 
to harmful suggestion or temptation, 
but after all only fallible human beings, 
and from these we proceed downward 
step by step until we reach the imbecile 
and hopelessly defective who must be a 
public charge. 

Between these extremes there are 
large masses of people who sway back¬ 
ward and forward, according to the in¬ 
fluences and ideals that are set up be¬ 
fore them. Beneath the surface there 
are latent tendencies and latent re¬ 
sources which, under favorable con¬ 
ditions and proper ideals, standards 
and suggestions, will cause a certain 
group of people to develop and meas¬ 
ure up to a high standard of citizenship. 
On the other hand, in response to ma¬ 
lignant or vicious ideals and standards 
of weakness, this same group will 
develop low standards of citizenship 
and perhaps be a menace to society. 

A Preventable Burden 

I would like to make clear at this 
point the chief grounds of my objection 
to alcohol. In the opportunity that 
has been given me to analyze the phys¬ 
ical condition and mental state of so 
many thousands of people, there has 
been borne in upon me this revelation 
of a tremendous burden of preventable 
physical and mental misery that is 
carried by the human race. No think¬ 
ing man can analyze this material 
without being well-nigh overwhelmed 
by the weight of evidence showing that 
mankind is making only a limited use 
of opportunities for securing physical 
and mental power and satisfaction in 
living. Through ignorance of the cau¬ 
sation of disease and physical degen¬ 
eration, man is continually assailed by 
infections, poisons and other menac- 



Relation of Alcohol to Society and Citizenship 


5 


ing factors to which he makes practi¬ 
cally no resistance. As his mental 
life develops and becomes more com¬ 
plex, he falls into physical neglect. 

It is unquestionably true that he 
needs some means of taking the edge 
from life strain. He must find some 
means of dulling or putting out of 
business his worry faculties; but when 
he uses a drug for such a purpose he not 
only risks damage to his tissues and 
impairs the functions of his body, but 
he shuts the door to opportunity, he 
evades the obligation to seek and estab¬ 
lish some avocation or habit that is con¬ 
structive and upbuilding. This is a 
point wholly missed by John Fiske and 
William James when they defended the 
so-called moderate use of alcohol to 
assist us over the pitfalls of life. Yet 
William James, himself, has said: 

Even if the day ever dawns in which it 
will not be needed to fight the old heavy 
battles against Nature, it (muscular ex¬ 
ercise) will still always be needed to furnish 
the background of sanity, serenity and 
cheerfulness to life, to give moral elasticity 
to our disposition, to round off the wiry 
edges of our fretfulness, and make us good- 
humored and easy of approach. 

The Fake and the Mask 

It is by struggle, not by compromise 
or disuse of our latent power, that we 
become strong, that we become con¬ 
scious of those powers. There are men 
who have lived and died ignorant of 
their latent strength, leaning always on 
alcohol as on a crutch. Flat-foot is 
cured not by an arch support, but by 
exercise. Moral and psychic flat-foot 
is too frequently treated by a brace or 
artificial support instead of by develop¬ 
ing the moral support. The sense of 
joyous well-being that characterizes 
healthy youth is due to hormones, sub¬ 
stances manufactured by the body in a 
state of health. Alcohol is a fake 
hormone, and in relying upon it we 


mask the need to put our bodies into a 
healthy state where hormones are 
produced that give the most glorious 
intoxicant in the world—the intoxicant 
of youth and health. These men, like 
many other philosophers, took no 
cognizance of the fact that a vast 
amount of fatigue and mental pain and 
maladjustment to social conditions has 
a remediable physical basis, and that in 
masking fatigue and fear and worry and 
psychic strain, we are often shutting the 
door of opportunity, compromising 
with infection or poison or physical 
disabilities. Ignorance of those facts 
is responsible for the note of pessimism 
and despair that runs through the 
writings of most philosophers and 
intellectuals. 

We must deplore the direct damage 
that alcohol does when used in gross 
excess, but it is used in gross excess by 
a comparatively limited number of 
people. I firmly believe that its greatest 
menace to society lies in its so-called 
moderate use, which, among the great 
mass of people who use it daily, but in 
so-called moderation, results in divert¬ 
ing these people from other resources 
of an upbuilding and constructive 
character. How much latent capacity 
for achievement, for adjustment, for 
business, social, scientific and artistic 
success, have been narcotized and 
suppressed throughout a whole lifetime 
by alcohol, we shall never know, but 
we know enough about its influence to 
be sure that it has thus maimed and 
crippled many millions of lives. 

Experience of Life Insurance 
Companies 

I have referred to my personal ex¬ 
perience in rating men for life insurance. 
The steady drinker has never found 
favor in life insurance, even when there 
was lacking any accurate statistical 
evidence of the extent to which alcohol 
affected longevity. The actual ex- 


6 


The Annals of the American Academy 


perience of life insurance companies 
among total abstainers and drinkers of 
varying degrees has of recent years 
been carefully tabulated, and this testi¬ 
mony is absolutely in line with that 


Total abstainers. 

Those who rarely use. 

Temperate users... 

Moderate users. 

received from the hospital, the clinic 
and the laboratory. 

Life insurance experience has been 
grouped to include four British com¬ 
panies and three American companies 
that have separated abstainers from 
non-abstainers. The excess mortality 
among non-abstainers was 32 per cent. 
It should be borne in mind that the 
non-abstainers were regarded as reason¬ 
ably temperate and thoroughly sound 
lives when they were accepted; hence 
this excess mortality does not include 
any considerable number of people 
who were actually intemperate in the 
popular sense of the word at the time 
they were accepted, but rather a group 
ranging from the casual drinker to the 
daily social drinker who never indulged 
to the point of actual intoxication, as 
the word is popularly used. 

Other studies grading the drinking 
classes more specifically are instructive 
as showing the regularity with which 
the death rate increases in any insured 
group with the degree of alcoholic in¬ 
dulgence. 

The Northwestern Mutual’s experi¬ 
ence shows the following: 


Total abstainers. 

Moderate, i.e., occasional users 

. Daily users of beer. 

Daily users of spirits. 


The experience of the New England 
Mutual is along the same line, but 
shows a much heavier death rate among 
the moderate users. This is stated as 
follows: 


In Terms of 
the Company's General 
Experience 

75% 

93% 

107% 

160% 


In Ter ms of 
the Company's Mor¬ 
tality Among Total 
Abstainers 
100 % 

124% 

143% 

213% 


In the Medico-Actuarial investiga¬ 
tion of the experience of forty-one 
American companies, it was found that 
the conservative daily user of alcohol 
had a mortality 18 per cent in excess of 
that of insured risks generally, while 
the liberal free users, but individuals 
considered thoroughly acceptable for 
life insurance, had a mortality 86 per 
cent in excess of the general. This 
shows the heavy burden of expense 
borne by abstainers or very moderate 
users of alcohol, in the matter of the 
extra death rate sustained by their 
fellow policyholders who use alcohol 
freely, yet not to a point that connotes 
intemperance, according to the popu¬ 
lar standards. 

Dr. Oscar H. Rogers, Medical Di¬ 
rector of the New York Life Insurance 
Company, one of the largest insurance 
companies in the world, with a very 
broad experience with all classes of 
risks, has this to say regarding the 
evidence from various sources as to the 
effect of the use of alcohol as a beverage 
on longevity: 

The evidence before us is conclusive that 
the so-called Anstie’s limit of 1J ounces or 


In Terms of 
the Company's General 
Experience 

90% 

107% 

120 % 

149% 


In Terms of 
the Company's Mor¬ 
tality Among Total 
Abstainers 
100 % 

119% 

133% 

166 % 










Relation of Alcohol to Society and Citizenship 


7 


three tablespoonfuls of alcohol a day is far 
too liberal. Indeed, there appears to be no 
limit within which alcohol may be entirely 
harmless. It is as if there were a direct 
relation between the amount of alcohol 
used and the amount of damage done to the 
body. The evidence is strong, also, that 
the damage,done persists a long time after 
it has been discontinued. Anyone who 
uses alcohol now, or has used it in the past, 
is a less desirable risk, all other things being 
equal, than a total abstainer and his un¬ 
desirability is in proportion to the freedom 
with which he has used the drug. 

Handicap Even Though Resisted 

It is well to bear in mind that this 
judgment is delivered by one of half a 
dozen men in the world who have had 
the heaviest business responsibility in 
making decisions of this sort as to the 
actual effect of alcohol on human life; 
that this authority has never been a 
propagandist, is not himself a total 
abstainer, but has formed his opinion in 
a dispassionate, cold-blooded and sci¬ 
entific way as a matter of necessity in 
wisely advising his insurance company 
as to their business practice in rating 
human beings who drink alcohol. One 
opinion of this sort is worth five thou¬ 
sand opinions from individuals who 
base their judgment on general observa¬ 
tion or scattered information or mere 
feeling or prejudice. 

Such figures show that alcohol is a 
handicap, but does not necessarily 
ruin or destroy every one that indulges 
in it. Nations that use alcohol do not 
necessarily pass out of existence. There 
is an average resistance to such an in¬ 
fluence, just as there is to communicable 
disease, consumption, typhoid, cancer, 
and many other horrible menaces to 
humanity, which science is now com¬ 
bating, and which have existed since the 
dawn of history; yet the human race 
has struggled on. Occasionally some 
branch of it, however, like the Cro- 
Magnon, fades out of existence. The 


rising and falling of nations result from 
many complex causes, but the fall of a 
great nation can usually be traced to 
self-indulgence, luxury and unwhole¬ 
some physical and moral standards. 

Now, optimism and pessimism have 
nothing whatever to do with scientific 
evidence, with the presentation of 
truth. One’s confidence in the future 
may vary according to his philosoph¬ 
ical viewpoint, but the really candid 
man of honest scientific mind must 
weigh evidence absolutely without 
bias, uninfluenced by emotion. My 
own situation with regard to these 
problems has been that of a scientific 
worker, a man searching for the truth, 
that he might convey it to others. 

Healthy Body Part of Good 
Citizenship 

My interest in alcohol has been the 
same as in focal infection, in venereal 
infection, in diet and exercise and a 
number of other things that have to 
do with the quality of human life. I 
have steadily refused to take part in 
any political or moral propaganda, as 
such, except the broad propaganda for 
sound health and sound ideals in living. 
I believe that these lie at the very 
basis of true citizenship. I believe 
that a healthy man is much more 
likely to be a good citizen, deliberate 
and careful in his judgment on impor¬ 
tant questions and not easily led into 
hysterical and ill-advised political or 
social movements. 

No one with any knowledge of hu¬ 
man nature and the pathology of the 
human mind can doubt that the essence 
and the core of so-called “red” prop¬ 
aganda arises in abnormal personal¬ 
ities and draws its largest support from 
the mentally and physically diseased. 

Therefore, I say that it is an obliga¬ 
tion of true citizenship, as implied in 
Huxley’s words, to measure up, not 
only to the moral standards of an en- 


8 


The Annals oe the American Academy 


lightened society and loyally to obey 
the laws of the country until they are 
changed by the will of the people, but 
to give a good account of the custody 
of the physical body in which the 
citizen lives and has his being. It is an 
obligation of citizenship to refrain from 
any act that tends to impair the quality 
or shorten the life of that body unless it 
be an act of justifiable self-sacrifice in 
defense of society or of some fellow 
being. 

A Defiant Age 

It is well for us to bear in mind that 
America has no special privileges from 
the Almighty; that our country is in a 
similar position to that of every living 
human being, confronted by oppor¬ 
tunities for development and menaced 
by factors of destruction. We have 
been placed here by some higher power 
and confronted by these opportunities. 
Whether we move forward and upward 
to higher planes of national welfare or 
downward to national deterioration 
and decay rests with ourselves, and 
depends wholly upon the ideals that we 
set up for our people to follow. This is 
an age when we need not more personal 
liberty, not more pampering and self- 
indulgence and influences contributory 
to ease and comfort, but less self-in¬ 
dulgence, less pampering, and more 
courage to face life struggle. It is 
only by struggle and work that en¬ 
durance and strength of mind and body 
is attained, and our country as a whole 
rests upon these qualities in the in¬ 
dividual citizen. 

The most characteristic feature of 
the world today is the breakdown of 
authority. Owing to the failure of a 
rapid and complete decision and dec¬ 
laration of peace, the war was followed 
by an amazing state of defiance of all 
authority. One government after an¬ 
other was toppled over. Even when 
the Allied forces were practically intact 
and their leaders in close conference, 


twenty-three wars were carried on in 
various parts of the world in open de¬ 
fiance of the wishes and mandates of 
the victorious powers. Over a very 
large area of the world’s surface, gov¬ 
ernments ceased to have any signifi¬ 
cance and the ordinary trappings and 
insignia of authority either disappeared 
or were held in contempt. Almost any¬ 
body in any part of the world could set 
up his own little government, start to 
fighting on his own account and put 
aside the normal wholesome and healthy 
state of honest toil. This hysteria has 
spread to our own country. In addi¬ 
tion to widespread open defiance, not 
only of the authorities, but of the prin¬ 
ciples upon which our government was 
founded, this hysterical unrest is aug¬ 
mented by the constructive anarchy of 
men who seek to bring into contempt 
that which stands quite as much as our 
flag for the principles of American liberty 
-—the Constitution of the United States. 

Granted that the Constitution is a 
human instrument and is subject to 
modification and change as our knowl¬ 
edge broadens and our ideals of con¬ 
duct and of political science improve, 
this matter is one that lies wholly in the 
hands of the people. There is an 
orderly machinery provided by wdiich 
the will of the people can be expressed 
in the Constitution. It is the privilege 
of any American citizen to question the 
wisdom of any part of that Constitu¬ 
tion; but it is not his privilege to insult 
or deny its authority so long as it stands 
as an expression of the country’s will. 
Any movement in that direction is 
constructive anarchy and an invitation 
to hold in contempt all forms of author¬ 
ity; indeed, to grant to the individual 
citizen that degree of personal liberty 
which connotes lawlessness and dis¬ 
order. 

The Real Question 

The question before the American 
people today in relation to prohibition 


Relation of Alcohol to Society and Citizenship 


9 


is not whether or not they shall have 
personal liberty. Personal liberty to 
do as they please, to do anything under 
any and all circumstances, they never 
can have under a free and enlightened 
government. The question to be de¬ 
cided is whether or not alcoholic bever¬ 
ages of a strength to prove toxic are a 
menace to society. If it be decided 
that they are a menace to society in 
their total influence, then it is con¬ 
stitutional to forbid the circulation of 
these beverages among the people. It 
is just as constitutional as to take 
rational measures for protecting us 
against tuberculosis, typhoid and vene¬ 
real disease. 

This cry of invasion of personal 
rights has been raised with regard to 
every decent measure that has ever 
been taken for the protection of soci¬ 
ety. Now the question as to whether 
alcoholic beverages of a strength that 
would induce their sale and make them 
worth discussing as social factors are 
injurious, has long since ceased to be a 
mere matter of opinion. We can no 
longer accept judgment on these mat¬ 
ters from lawyers, clergymen, stock 
brokers, shopkeepers, saloon keepers 
and brewers, or even physicians and 
physiologists, unless they give us sat¬ 
isfying evidence to support their opin¬ 
ions. 

Rum has never really risen to the 
dignity of being a demon. It is not 
fair to the demons to so class it. Rum 
is a problem in pharmacology and not 
in demonology. Now, as even a sober 
man may not know the difference 
between demonology and pharmacol¬ 
ogy, I will explain that pharmacology 
relates to the effects of drugs on the 
human body. 

“Of Such Hideous Mien” 

It is my firm belief that when the 
people fully appreciate this fact—that 
alcohol, a mere combination of atoms 


of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen, is 
really a drug problem—the problem 
will be largely solved. It is true that 
drug addiction is regrettably common, 
but not nearly so prevalent as alcoholic 
indulgence, and drug addiction all 
sane people frankly condemn, however 
slight the indulgence. 

No sane man will ask another to 
enter a corner drug store and join him 
in a dose of opium, yet many sane men 
have invited their friends into the 
corner saloon or up to the bar to “bend 
the merry elbow” without in the least 
realizing that they are inviting to drug 
addiction. This attitude of mind is 
partly due to ignorance of the physio¬ 
logical effects of alcohol and partly to 
the traditions that surround its use. 

The fact that alcohol is blended in 
beverages supposed to have thirst¬ 
quenching qualities, and that these 
beverages are used on the table and 
thus admitted into the good society of 
wholesome food, has served to mask 
its insidious drug effects. If we took 
our alcohol in pellets or by hypodermic 
injection, these drug effects would not 
be camouflaged. 

Drug Effects of Alcohol 

What are these drug effects of al¬ 
cohol? Are they in any sense conserv¬ 
ative? Do they give even temporary 
efficiency to any function of the body? 
On the other hand, is there any evi¬ 
dence that these drug effects are 
similar to those of other drugs that 
humanity reaches for in an effort to 
find a short cut to happiness, to free¬ 
dom from responsibility, or rather to 
evasion of responsibility, and of a fair 
stand-up fight with environment? 

Professor Francis C. Benedict of the 
Carnegie Institution, laboring in the 
field of pure science, with no motive 
other than to seek the truth, estab¬ 
lished the toxic effect of even moder¬ 
ate doses of alcohol on the human body. 


10 


The Annals of the American Academy 


In his experiments it was found that, 
contrary to the ideas of many former 
observers, the first effect of alcohol is 
on the lower elements of the nervous 
system: the so-called reflex functions 
that work independently of our con¬ 
scious control. These are largely of a 
protective character. Many of the 
bodily activities are of this reflex 
nature, automatic, and undirected by 
conscious effort. Upon all these func¬ 
tions tested, alcohol w^as found in every 
instance to exert a depressant action, 
in doses comparable to moderate bever¬ 
age doses. No one questions in these 
days the depressant effect of alcohol 
when given in large doses, but that a 
moderate use of beverage doses could 
exert any such influence has been a 
matter of some debate. In the light 
of the experiments of Professor Bene¬ 
dict, this matter now seems to be 
definitely settled. 

As an instance of this depressant 
action, we may mention the knee-jerk 
which is elicited by striking the tendon 
just below the knee cap; immediately 
there is an upward movement of the leg. 

This response was delayed in 10 per 
cent under moderate use of alcohol. 
This was an old-time test for drunken¬ 
ness, the knee-jerk being practically 
abolished in cases of intoxication. The 
experiment shows that when there is no 
other visible evidence of intoxication, 
the knee-jerk is delayed by a moderate 
beverage dose of alcohol. The same 
influences are evident on the protective 
eyelid or wink reflex, which is usually 
brought out by a sudden stimulation 
such as light or noise. The extent of 
the lid movement was decreased 9 per 
cent and the time of the response in¬ 
creased 7 per cent; also the sensitivity 
to electrical stimulation was decreased 
by 14 per cent. 

Simple eye movements and finger 
movements were next tested which are 
not under voluntary control, and a 


decrease of velocity of the eye move¬ 
ments was 11 per cent. The speed of 
the finger movements decreased 9 per 
cent, so if you wish to throw a scare into 
a man who has been drinking too much, 
just tell him that he will reduce the 
reciprocal innervation of his middle 
finger by 9 per cent to 90 per cent, ac¬ 
cording to the indulgence, if he does not 
let up. 

Tests were also made on the influence 
of alcohol on the circulation and pulse, 
where it was found that it had a de¬ 
pressing effect on the nerve centers 
that control and stabilize the action of 
the heart. There was increased rapid¬ 
ity of the pulse, but no added strength 
to the heart action; the brake was 
simply taken off the heart. 

The action of alcohol on the higher 
mental processes cannot be so ac¬ 
curately measured as it can be on these 
lower nervous mechanisms, but dis¬ 
tinct impairment of memory and a 
lowering of the efficiency in such work 
as that of typesetters has been noted by 
many eminent observers. 

The idea formerly held that alcohol 
exerts its first and greatest effects on 
higher nerve centers was not supported 
by Benedict’s experiment. When we 
consider the matter, it is not logical to 
expect such a finding. The higher 
brain functions are those that direct 
our most important actions. They 
guide us in the struggle for existence. 
If they were so feeble that they would 
be the first to yield to such an influence 
as alcohol, the race could hardly sur¬ 
vive. As a matter of fact, they have 
extraordinary resisting powers. A 
man can offer mental resistance to 
drunkenness to an astonishing degree 
when the rest of his body is narcotized, 
and can be shocked out of drunken¬ 
ness by some strong mental effect. 
This very fact—the power of the mind 
to resist the influence of alcohol on 
these higher nerves and functions— 


Relation of Alcohol to Society and Citizenship 


11 


partly accounts for the slight effects 
found by Benedict in testing the mem¬ 
ory in his laboratory experiment. When 
the mind “lets go” these effects are 
augmented. 

The experiments show, however, that 
as the lower spinal activities recover 
from alcoholic influence, the higher 
show a tendency to yield to alcoholic 
depression. We have here indubitable 
evidence that ordinary beverage doses 
of alcohol produce positive drug effects 
of an injurious character, likely to con¬ 
tribute to accident, and to impair the 
mechanical protective mechanism of the 
body. 

From other sources we have evidence 
of a lowering of resistance to infection 
and a tendency to lower blood pressure, 
and therefore to contribute to shock. 

Hospital Reports 

Alcohol was dreaded by physicians 
in the war zone because it contributed 
to shock and lowered resistance to in¬ 
fection—the two great menaces to the 
soldier. The workman who takes al¬ 
cohol, even in so-called moderation, is 
menaced in the same way. If he be¬ 
comes ill, alcohol lowers his resistance 
to disease, increases his liability to ac¬ 
cident, and in the event of accident or 
disease occurring, his chances of re¬ 
covery are lessened. Alcohol masks 
fatigue but does not cure; it deters a 
worker from seeking normal rest. 

In Boston, at the Peter Bent Brig¬ 
ham Hospital, it was demonstrated 
that, in practically the only remaining 
therapeutic field in which alcohol was 
generally used by the profession— 
diabetes—it was found to be actually 
injurious instead of beneficial, as form¬ 
erly supposed. 

At the Cook County Hospital in 
Chicago, an investigation was recently 
made of the death rate from pneumonia 
among abstainers as compared to users 
of alcohol; 3,422 cases were studied. 


In the abstainers’ group, ages 30 to 39, 
the death rate was 18.4 per cent; in the 
moderate group, 21.1 per cent; in the 
excessive group, 42.5 per cent. It was 
stated that there had been noted an 
increase in recent years of the propor¬ 
tion of abstainers, and that while in 
pre-prohibition years there had been 
annually from 20 to 43 cases of delir¬ 
ium tremens among pneumonia pa¬ 
tients, in 1917-22 there was only one 
case. 

The life insurance statistics fully 
support these hospital reports. In the 
drinking groups, the death rates from 
Bright’s disease, pneumonia and sui¬ 
cide was three times that among policy¬ 
holders generally. 

Laboratory evidence and mortality 
statistics, two entirely separate fields 
of investigation, join their testimony as 
to this toxic effect. 

The real question before the people 
is: Shall a beverage that is toxic be 
permitted to circulate? The word 
“intoxicating” has no standardized 
meaning. To one man it means a 
state in which one might commit mur¬ 
der, incite a riot, or openly disturb the 
peace. To others it means mere lo¬ 
quacity, foolish talk, and an ability to 
see humor where none exists. A man’s 
own testimony as to whether he is in¬ 
toxicated is absolutely worthless. The 
testimony of a lay observer may also 
be worthless, if we interpret intoxica¬ 
tion as a condition in which the bodily 
state is lowered from that of perfect 
health as a result of the administration 
of a drug. 

If it be found that in a group of peo¬ 
ple who use alcohol as a beverage the 
death rate is excessive and the resist¬ 
ance to disease is lowered, it is imma¬ 
terial as to whether this group is in¬ 
toxicated in the popular sense of the 
word. If we are simply seeking to 
restrain alcoholic murders and riots 
and open disorder, wife-beating, child- 


n 


The Annals of the American Academy 


neglect, hideous brutality and open 
licentiousness, we are indeed dealing 
with this situation in a very superficial 
and stupid manner. If we are seeking 
to protect society also against the in¬ 
sidious, chronic alcoholism which is not 
characterized by obvious intoxication, 
we are really striking at the root of the 
alcohol evil. 

We must appreciate that alcohol, 
like other narcotic drugs, is not alone 
harmful in its immediate toxic effect, 
but in its tendency to enfeeble the will 
power and lead to increased indulgence. 
Even though 2.75 per cent beer does 
not in average amounts induce any 
visible evidence of intoxication that a 
jury would recognize, the fact that the 
habitual use of this beverage by thou¬ 
sands of people would in time induce a 
certain proportion of these people to 
increase their indulgence, is a far more 
important fact than the question as to 
whether a man becomes a little talka¬ 
tive and emotionally uncontrollable 
after a few glasses of beer. 

We are repeatedly told of the up¬ 
lifting effects of light wines and beers in 
the countries where they are widely 
used; but we get no such testimony 
from the medical profession in such 
countries. In France, particularly, 
there was a veritable wail of agony 
during the war from the medical pro¬ 
fession with regard to the need for 
alcoholic reform. The use of light 
wines and beers has not apparently 
inoculated these peoples against the 
evils of alcoholism. Neither are the 
death rates or the hygienic conditions 
in these countries any warrant for 
regarding their alcoholic customs as 
beneficial. True, we often hear ad¬ 
vanced the pleas that in Mohammedan 
countries where alcohol is not used the 
population is often degraded and 
physically degenerate; but there are so 
many other factors that influence 
racial quality that such comments have 


little meaning. England’s power was 
not due either to alcohol or roast beef, 
any more than Greece’s intellectual 
clarity and artistic excellence was due 
to fish food. 

Fortunately, the statistics that we 
rely upon are based on comparisons of 
the results in homogeneous groups, 
groups that were practically the same 
except for alcoholic indulgence; and in 
these groups the death rate increases as 
alcoholic indulgence increased and as 
the exposure to alcoholic influence in¬ 
creases, as in various occupations. 

Fear Complex 

From my own observation of many 
thousands of people, drinkers and non¬ 
drinkers, I am led to regard the basis of 
drink indulgence as fear—fear of not 
measuring up to some opportunity, 
whether of enjoyment or of struggle. 
A man will drink, if his golf score is 
poor, to ease his discouragement; he 
will drink, if it is fine, in fear lest he 
will not sufficiently enjoy his victory. 
As Bunge puts it, they drink and they 
drink and they drink. The man who 
is absolutely brave, who is high in self- 
confidence, who believes he can meas¬ 
ure up well in all of life’s tests, would be 
a stupid dolt to take a drink. A man 
who is really sound and confident and 
strong will move into action wherever 
life’s opportunity is calling without the 
need to blunt his fear faculties with a 
narcotic. A man who fears to move 
into action without a narcotic and to 
mix with his fellows and enjoy the 
really good things of life will never gain 
that capacity by blunting with alcohol 
the discriminating intelligence which 
really distinguishes him from the brute. 

In Conclusion 

As to results this far attained by 
prohibition, there is much that can be 
said. There are strong indications of 


Relation of Alcohol to Society and Citizenship 


13 


what its permanent influence would be; 
but, when we are making comparisons 
with an alcoholic experiment of 30,000 
years’ duration, we may well ask for a 
more extended period of observation 
before we begin to talk very positively 
about results. We know that the 
practical elimination of the saloon has 
cleared up many foci of crime and dis¬ 
order. I have been told by a number of 
men doing important surgical work in 
industry, that there has been a marked 
reduction in the first-of-the-week-cas- 
ualty list, which was formerly largely 
ascribed to alcohol. 

As to any harmful effects of pro¬ 
hibition, perhaps the best field in which 
that was tried out was the Army. 
Huge masses of men deprived of al¬ 
cohol were kept under medical observa¬ 
tion and there was absolutely no 
evidence that abstinence occasioned 
any increase in the psychoses or was 
translated into any conditions unfavor^^ 
ably affecting the total condition of the 
group. 

Of course, there will be attempts to 
evade the law; of course there will be 
desperate drug addicts who will do 
desperate things. Analogous condi¬ 
tions arise whenever any wholesome 
law is enforced. There will be some 
casualties among those who do not 
abide by the law. Any attempt to 
befog the issue by exaggerating such 
occurrences is treating a big question 
in a most trivial and puerile way. 

The death rate from alcoholism per 
100,000 among premium-paying in¬ 
dustrial policyholders of the Metro¬ 
politan Life Insurance Company, for 
the years indicated, was as follows: 

1912 . 5.3 

1913 . 5.2 

1914 . 4.7 

1915 . 4.1 

1916 . 5.1 

1917 . 4.9 

1918 . I- 8 


1919 . 1.4 

1920 .6 

1921 .9 

In 14 large American cities, includ¬ 
ing New York and Chicago, the deaths 
from alcoholism in 1916 were 1,799; in 
1920, 276. 

These figures are offered for what 
they are worth; but I trust I have made 
it clear that my main concern about 
alcohol is not the comparatively lim¬ 
ited number of deaths directly due to 
it, but the insidious deforming influence 
that it exerts on life, its injury to 
health and the latent capacity for 
normal enjoyment. 

One of the most interesting develop¬ 
ments has been the ease and cheerful¬ 
ness with which a very large number of 
moderate drinkers have given up this 
indulgence and now wonder why they 
ever wasted time and money on it. In 
other words, I believe that the convic¬ 
tion is gradually spreading abroad that 
the game was not worth the candle; all 
of which shows that a few years of 
actual experience is worth many mil¬ 
lion words of argument even from the 
wisest brains. 

To sum up the evidence: It is 
quite possible that the immediate 
destructive effect of alcohol on the 
tissues of the body has been much 
exaggerated, but its indirect harmful 
effect on life itself, on conduct, on our 
ability to direct our lives into channels 
that lead to health, long life and hap¬ 
piness, has been greatly underestimated. 

I would not be misunderstood in this 
matter. I am not advocating a hair- 
shirt, cheerless existence, in which the 
sole satisfaction in living that we 
attain is a sense of duty well performed. 
This sense is a splendid underpinning 
for any life. 

A Worthwhile Credo 

But I firmly believe in the possibility 
of a joyous existence, of laughter that 












14 


The Annals of the American Academy 


is not poison-produced, of red-blooded 
vital enjoyment of the good things of 
life not seen through an alcoholic 
haze. As against that personal lib¬ 
erty which is a mask for mere self¬ 


indulgence,! would place that personal 
freedom which means physical free¬ 
dom—freedom and ability and strength 
to stand alone, to meet life’s struggles 
clear-eyed, confident and smiling. 


Prohibition 

By The Rev. Floyd W. Tomkins, D.D., LL.D. 

Philadelphia 


A T first sight the word is not at¬ 
tractive. It is a negation; it 
suggests a warning and a consequent 
penalty for transgression. We are 
living in an era of positive action and 
suggestion. Individualism and per¬ 
sonal liberty are on the field and de¬ 
mand the removal of all shackles. “I 
am the master of my fate,” the man 
cries. 

Personal Liberty Necessarily 
Curtailed 

But, if we are willing to reason 
calmly, we must see that all law is a 
suggestion of the limitation of personal 
liberty, and law is as much a necessity 
for human, and therefore imperfect, 
beings as breathing and eating and 
sleeping. Liberty, unless governed by 
law, is not liberty at all, but license. 
For every man to do that which seems 
good in his own sight is fatal not only to 
order but to the peace of the individual. 
There is no cry which has been uttered 
in connection with the discussion of 
prohibition which is so unreasonable— 
one might almost say ridiculous—as 
this of “personal liberty.” For our 
civilization has curtailed personal lib¬ 
erty in so many ways that we are no 
longer absolutely free agents, but 
bound and restrained by law. 

Those who cast aside the Ten Com¬ 
mandments because they say “Thou 
shalt not,” might just as well cast aside 
all community life and all civilization, 
for both are creative of walls and fences, 
which not only shut out bad things, 
but shut in the man whose grounds are 
thus walled or fenced. We are bound 
to deny ourselves for the good of others. 
And so the name “Prohibition” is not 


so displeasing if we recognize it as sug¬ 
gesting a new “Thou shalt not” for the 
greater good of the people, and in the 
final analysis, for the good of the indi¬ 
vidual also. 

Is Prohibition Worth While? 

The question arises, then, is prohibi¬ 
tion good for the people? Has it 
proved itself worth while? Added to 
this comes the further question, has the 
law been enforced and can it be en¬ 
forced? Aside from the moral and re¬ 
ligious side of the question, there can be 
no doubt as to the answer. Even the 
most extreme anti-prohibitionist does 
not want the saloon brought back. 
And why? Because he recognizes the 
menace of intoxicating drink to the 
peace and safety of a community. He 
knows how political questions, partic¬ 
ularly of a local character, are “solved” 
in a saloon over the intoxicating cup. 
He knows how the drunkards are 
turned out from the saloon to make a 
nuisance of themselves in the commu¬ 
nity and in their homes. No one of 
these men who talk of freedom would 
want a saloon next to his own home. 

But common sense declares that the 
transfer of the saloon habit and spirit 
to the home or the club or the lodge is 
bound to work the same injury. The 
intoxicating beverage is a menace 
wherever and whenever it has a pro¬ 
spective victim. And the miseries of 
drunkenness are not confined to the 
hovel or the dive. The rich man’s 
home has tragedies enough and to 
spare, and it is comparatively easy to 
trace the intoxicating virus in spite of 
seclusion and forbidden reports. 

Nor can the question of “light wines 


15 


16 


The Annals of the American Academy 


and beer” alter the facts. Those of us 
who know, from contact with humanity 
in all grades, can testify, first, that the 
American cannot rest content even 
with “light wines,” but excess masters 
him; second, that beer is intoxicating 
as the masses of Americans use it; and 
third, that any door opened on a crack 
can and will, easily and inevitably, 
swing on its hinges. No drunkard 
ever mastered his appetite by “taper¬ 
ing off.” The evils of drink cannot be 
conquered by “moderation” so long as 
there are beings who refuse to recognize 
law as binding or themselves as weak. 

Force of the Amendment 

That the Constitutional Amend¬ 
ment, prohibiting the use of intoxicants, 
has already proved itself advantageous, 
has been abundantly shown to those 
who are willing to hear and read. The 
fact that the President 1 has recently 
spoken strongly in favor of law enforce¬ 
ment and has taken a firm stand 
regarding prohibition will doubtless 
make the whole question a campaign 
issue in the next presidential election. 
But still there are those who question, 
first, the wisdom of the Volstead Act, 
and second, the possibility of enforce¬ 
ment. 

It may be stated without fear of con¬ 
tradiction that already the law is en¬ 
forced as well as the law against steal¬ 
ing, for instance, or banditry, and 
perhaps even better. Moreover, we 
must remember that the so-called 
liquor interests have had our country 
under great control, politically and 
morally, for fifty years, and it is hardly 
to be expected that in a short time 
those interests can be mastered. In¬ 
deed, it is really a wonderful thing that, 
in spite of secret as well as open opposi¬ 
tion, and in spite of daring violations 
of the law, there has come a change so 
marked in industrial and economic as 
1 Written before President Harding’s death. 


well as social affairs that the facts can¬ 
not be denied. 

In the West particularly this is 
evident, and the honest observer, 
while not denying the conditions in our 
large cities, can note great changes in 
the East. The Literary Digest for 
July 7 has a number of interesting 
quotations from newspapers both of the 
East and West, called forth by the 
President’s speeches in the West, but 
bearing upon the whole issue. A few 
quotations may be made here: 

A PROHIBITION ENFORCEMENT 
PLANK in the next Republican platform 
was made virtually certain, journalistic 
observers agree, when President Harding 
came out flat-footedly in Denver last week 
for the Eighteenth Amendment and the 
strict enforcement of the Volstead Law. 
In a speech “as dry as the sunburned and 
whitened bones around a desert water- 
hole,” he rejected the idea that the Pro¬ 
hibition Amendment would ever be re¬ 
pealed; expressed the belief that “what¬ 
ever changes (in the enforcement law) 
may be made will represent the sincere 
purpose of the effective enforcement, 
rather than moderation of the general pol¬ 
icy”; declared that “the country and the 
nation will not permit the law of the land 
to be made a by-word”; warned the rich 
who enjoy the luxury of legally stocked 
pre-prohibition cellars that their immu¬ 
nity is resented by millions of Americans; 
told the patrons of bootleggers that they 
are impairing the moral fiber of the Repub¬ 
lic; and declared that the problem before 
the nation today is “to remove lawless 
drinking as a menace to the Republic it¬ 
self.” 

“In his Denver speech,” declares United 
States Attorney Colonel William Hayward, 
“the President has built a dry plank into his 
party’s platform.” “He has accepted the 
political challenge of the ‘wets’ in his own 
party and the ‘wets’ of the Democracy, 
headed by Governor Smith,” remarks the 
Philadelphia Public Ledger (Ind.), which 
thinks that in so doing both his political 
morality and his political ^strategy are 


Prohibition 


17 


sound. “To Governor A1 Smith’s ‘I 
won’t,’ President Harding answers ‘I 
will,’ ” says the Republican Los Angeles Ex¬ 
press, which is convinced that by his un¬ 
compromising stand he “has more than 
doubled his political strength; has made 
his renomination, already certain, doubly 
desirable”; and has become “the captain 
of the great host of men and women who 
believe in the Constitution and who render 
obedience to the law.” 

“In his speech,” says the Denver Rocky 
Mountain News (Rep.), “the President 
‘struck the keynote for next year,’ and as 
a result ‘the law-abiding anti-booze ele¬ 
ments in the country are looking to him 
and his party to hold high the white flag 
of prohibition against the Smiths and 
others less open, who would return by a 

devious track to the old days and the old 
> >> 

ways. 

“With the enforcement of the Eighteenth 
Amendment as the big issue,” declares the 
Buffalo Evening News (Rep.), “the Re¬ 
publican Party can meet the campaign of 
1924 with every assurance of success.” 
President Harding “has raised a moral 
issue second only in importance to the 
moral issue of the abolition of slavery, for 
the support of which the Republican 
Party was created,” avers the Rochester 
Democrat and Chronicle (Rep.), which 
continues: 

“States’ rights were made the pretense 
for the action of the Democratic Party in 
supporting slavery, just as states’ rights 
have been made the issue by Governor 
Smith in attempting to nullify the Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment. Honest enforcement 
of prohibition by the states and honest 
observance of the law by the individual 
represent the only patriotic course so long 
as the Prohibition Amendment remains a 
part of the federal Constitution and respon¬ 
sibility for its enforcement rests with equal 
force upon the national and state govern¬ 
ments.” 

“As a result of the President’s Denver 
address,” says the Philadelphia Inquirer 
(Rep.), “the Republican Party in the Con¬ 
vention next year will unquestionably 
make a flat-footed declaration for enforce¬ 


ment and the obligation of the people to 
uphold the law.” The Omaha Bee (Rep.) 
applauds the President for taking issue 
with “those who urge that because the 
prohibition laws are difficult to enforce 
they should be repealed.” To the Spo¬ 
kane Spokesman-Review (Rep.) his words 
are “like a burst of sunshine, dispelling 
the foggy reasoning of men like Governor 
Smith.” “His stand,” says the Pitts¬ 
burgh Gazette Times (Rep.), “is that of ‘a 
faithful executive and a wise politician.’ ” 

Turning to the independent press, we 
find there also a large volume of comment 
favorable to the President’s position. He 
commits his party to “unmitigated prohibi¬ 
tion,” remarks the Providence Journal. 
He “gives voice to the overwhelming senti¬ 
ment of the people of the Middle West,” 
adds the Kansas City Star. He “calls 
attention to a serious menace,” says the 
Seattle Times. He “throws a revealing 
light on the real issue raised by the effort 
of the liquor interests to have the states 
nullify the Eighteenth Amendment,” 
observes the New York Evening Mail , 
which goes on to say: 

“Law, not liquor, is the paramount 
question. It is ‘every citizen’s privilege 
to seek to amend any law he does not 
favor. It is equally his duty to obey it so 
long as it stands as the law. The Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment is the law of the land. 
Disobeying it as individuals or ignoring it 
as states merely invites to far more serious 
situations in later years.’ ” 

And in another independent paper, 
the New York Evening Post , we read: 

President Harding has not spoken hast¬ 
ily. He knows more about public senti¬ 
ment in the various sections of the country 
than the enemies of prohibition realize. 
In our opinion, the Democratic Party will 
hesitate long before it takes a different 
attitude upon prohibition from that 
adopted by President Harding. 

Of course these quotations touch 
chiefly upon the action, possible or 
assumed, of the two great national 
parties. But reading between the 
lines they reveal an interest and a 


3 


18 


The Annals of the American Academy 


determination as regards the whole 
question of prohibition, which cannot 
be lightly dismissed, for these papers 
make clear the popular feeling in the 
localities where they make their asser¬ 
tions. 

Specific Results Quoted 

“But what results can be shown?” 
asks the doubter. We might cite 
numerous facts, such as the increase of 
deposits in the pavings banks, the 
crowded institutions of learning, both 
public and private, from the grammar 
school to the high school, and the 
marked decrease in the inmates of our 
prisons and penitentiaries, such as 
Sing Sing and Joliet. To these also 
should be added the increase in com¬ 
parative prosperity amongst the poor, 
to which all church workers and phil¬ 
anthropic folk can bear witness. But 
we can be more specific. In 1922 
the Manufacturers’ Record Publishing 
Company of Baltimore put forth a 
remarkable document of 99 pages, 
entitled “The Prohibition Question 
Viewed from the Economic and Moral 
Standpoint.” From this we will 
quote freely, since it gives the views 
and experiences of manufacturers, 
lawyers, bankers, etc. A quotation 
from President Harding rightly takes 
precedence: 

In every community men and women 
have had an opportunity now to know 
what prohibition means. They know that 
debts are more promptly paid, that men 
take home the wages that once were wasted 
in saloons; that families are better clothed 
and fed, and more money finds its way into 
the savings banks. The liquor traffic was 
destructive of much that was most precious 
in American life. In the face of so much 
evidence on that point, what conscientious 
man would want to let his own selfish de¬ 
sires influence him to vote to bring it 
back? In another generation I believe 
that liquor will have disappeared not merely 
from our politics, but from our memories. 


From this we may turn for a mo¬ 
ment to Great Britain, whence just 
now propagandists are seeking to bring 
words of criticism and ridicule: 

More than a year ago Lord Leverhulme, 
probably the foremost business man of 
England, after studying the effect of pro¬ 
hibition in the United States, said that if 
England would adopt prohibition it would 
thereby save enough in five years to pay 
its indebtedness to the United States. The 
enormous waste of money in Britain’s 
drink bill is, however, only one side of the 
loss, for drink makes likewise an even 
greater loss in efficiency and in human 
achievements without regard to the moral 
issue involved. These facts are being 
stressed more and more vigorously in 
Great Britain, and the Pioneer of Bramp¬ 
ton, Canada, in a discussion of this subject 
recently said: 

“At the annual meeting of the United 
Kingdom Alliance in Manchester, there 
was much criticism and comment on Brit¬ 
ain’s spending of £470,000,000 on strong 
drink in the past year. 

“Mr. Leif Jones, commenting on the 
Government claim that it had got £200,- 
000,000 out of the drinking part of the 
community, said that the Government 
neglected to realize how much of it the Gov¬ 
ernment spent in undoing the evil that 
drink caused the nation. His own con¬ 
viction was that no government in the 
world got a net revenue out of the drink 
traffic. That £470,000,000 represented 
roughly £50 a year for every family of five 
in the country. 

“Hon. Geoffrey Howard said that surely 
anyone who had taken the trouble to study 
the figures of the drink bill must realize 
that drink was a contributory cause to the 
great problem of unemployment. Four 
hundred and seventy million pounds were 
spent in drink last year by a poorer coun¬ 
try, and not spent out of the superfluities, 
but at the expense of necessaries. We 
spent in eight days what would keep the 
hospitals going for a year. Four days of 
total abstinence would provide what Dr. 
Nansen wanted to feed the starving Rus¬ 
sians. 

“Rear Admiral Sir Harry Stileman 


Prohibition 


19 


(Director of Dr. Barnardo’s Homes) said 
that, if lie could only have one half of the 
money spent in a day on drink in Great 
Britain, he could feed, clothe, educate, and 
place out in life all the 7,200 children in the 
Barnardo Homes and have a balance at the 
end of the year. 

“Mr. Philip Snowden said that we were 
spending two and a half times more on 
drink than upon armaments, and the result 
was at least two and a half times more 
destructive. We had too many nonpro¬ 
ducers in our economic system, but worse 
than these were the producers who were 
engaged in destroying wealth and causing 
the mental and physical deterioration of 
the race. After all, then, the temperance 
movement was the greatest anti waste cru¬ 
sade.” 

One-half the money spent on drink in 
one day in Britain would feed, and educate 
and clothe 7,200 children for a year, with 
some left over. 

Will not every advocate of the liquor 
traffic stop for a moment to think how 
much prohibition of the liquor traffic will 
mean in saving women and children and 
clothing and feeding them? Our liquor 
bill prior to prohibition was even larger 
than that of Britain. What an immeas¬ 
urable waste of life, of efficiency, and of 
money it produced and yet some people 
would, if they had the power, bring that 
curse back upon our country.. 

Turn to some of our manufacturers. 
N. G. Spangler, General Manager of 
The Jackson Iron and Steel Co., 
Jackson, Ohio, declares: 

With the coming of prohibition our 
troubles from drink disappeared. Under 
the saloon system, for two or three days 
after each pay day we had trouble to secure 
men to man our plant. This has been 
entirely eliminated, absenteeism from work 
at other times has been very greatly re¬ 
duced and efficiency improved. The pass¬ 
ing of “Hangovers from a sloppy night 
before” has created a better feeling, result¬ 
ing in fewer grievances. 

There is more interest taken in home 
life, which is reflected in a greater number 
of men paying for their homes, improving 


its furnishings, providing better shoes and 
clothing for their little ones, and increased 
savings deposits. 

School attendance, both public and Sun¬ 
day school, has improved. Merchants as 
well as the families have been benefited in • 
that sales have increased and the collections 
are better. The morale of the community 
has made wonderful progress. 

Notwithstanding, the fact that all our 
principle industries were shut down by a 
strike in 1919 for six months, and these 
industries only operated about six months 
in 1920, three months in 1921, and none so 
far this year have resumed, there has been 
comparatively little suffering. Comparing 
the last twenty-seven months, in which 
there has been only fifteen months of em¬ 
ployment with any shut down of three 
months’ duration under the saloon regime, 
conditions in our city have been easily a 
hundred per cent better. In fact it has 
been the common speculation in our city, 
“What would be our lot if we had saloons, 
with the great unemployment of such long 
standing.” 

Our community is a hot bed of Union¬ 
ism, yet the laboring people are almost a 
unit in the support of the Constitution and 
prohibition. We find this feature else¬ 
where predominating, which brings us to 
the belief that the demands for “light 
wines and beer” by the labor unions is 
almost wholly with the officers and is purely 
propaganda. 

It is our observation that the laboring 
man and the poor are not the lawbreak¬ 
ers, but it lies more largely with the rich 
and the well to do, who seem to think it 
smart; these are the real malefactors. 
Their smartness in this is the rankest 
stupidity, for as a class they would suffer 
most should the lawless get control and 
break up all law. 

If the daily press by common agreement 
would turn its back on the liquor interests’ 
gold, eliminate their paid-for propaganda, 
and do their whole duty to this great Re¬ 
public, by giving the Constitution their 
unstinted support, the situation would 
clear up in a very short while. The great 
trouble is not with the people at large, it is 
the attitude of the daily press in its attempt 


20 


The Annals of the American Academy 


to break down the Constitution, the 
Amendment being as much a part thereof 
as the original. Their attitude encourages 
law breaking, and makes spineless officials 
more lax. Maximum fines and prison 
terms is the best antidote. 

No good citizen will try to break down 
the Constitution for which millions fought 
and which is the foundation of the Re¬ 
public. 

Here is • a remarkable statement 
from Warren S. Stone, Grand Chief 
of The Brotherhood of Locomotive 
Engineers: 

The longer I live, and the more I see of 
it, the more bitterly I am opposed to the 
entire question of the manufacture and 
sale of liquor, because I look upon it as the 
basis and foundation of 90 per cent of the 
crime and criminals we have in the country 
today. 

In the study of the labor problems, I 
find a marked improvement in the number 
of men who are saving their money and 
who own their homes or are buying their 
homes, and I find a decided improvement 
in the home life of the workers, due to the 
fact that the women and children have more 
food, more clothing and better care in every 
way. Back of all that, the worker takes 
his family and goes to the picture show or 
to the park now, when he formerly spent 
his evenings in the saloon drinking and 
spending his money. 

There is a decided improvement since 
Prohibition came, and while it is true we 
have the illicit manufacture and sale of 
liquor, yet it is largely used by those of the 
leisure class, and it has the decided ad¬ 
vantage of destroying many of these par¬ 
asites because much of the manufactured 
liquor of today is deadly poison. Liquor 
is also used and there is much drunkenness 
among the class of our young people who 
desire to believe, or make the world be¬ 
lieve, that they are “fast” or “tough.” 

Back of all that, I think I can truthfully 
say that drunkenness has decreased at 
least 75 per cent among the workers. 

Charles Thaddeus Terry, a leading 
New York attorney, states his opinion 
and experience as follows: 


I have not changed my judgment, in the 
slightest degree, from what, it was five 
years ago, except that I have been con¬ 
firmed and strengthened in the conviction 
that prohibition is one of the most be¬ 
neficent influences which this country has 
ever enjoyed. 

It has destroyed the corner saloon, it has 
to a very large extent caused the pay enve¬ 
lopes of the breadwinners of families to be 
taken home intact and used for the legiti¬ 
mate purposes of the support of the fam¬ 
ily, instead of being wasted for liquor, as 
in days past. It has relieved jails and 
poorhouses to a very large extent of their 
former occupants, and resulted in a con¬ 
sequent decrease, as far as those purposes 
were concerned, in the taxation burdens of 
the various communities. 

There are, of course, still those who prate 
about destruction of so-called “personal 
liberty”; but no one who has studied his¬ 
tory will pay the slightest attention to that 
outcry, for the reason that it has been the 
slogan of all those who, from the beginning 
of time, were eager to give some excuse, 
however false and however empty, for in¬ 
dulgence in their own appetites, and for 
violations of the laws of God and man. 

One also hears complaints that the pro¬ 
hibition measures were enacted through 
unfair methods and at a time when people 
of the country were off their guard; but I 
confidently believe that if the question were 
now put to a nation-wide referendum, 
there would be an overwhelming majority 
in favor of a continuance of the prohibition 
measures. I hear no one, except those who 
were of such circumstances as to be able to 
a greater or less extent to fill their cellars 
with liquor in anticipation of prohibition, 
giving anything but praise to the prohibi¬ 
tion enforcement. Even those who for¬ 
merly were too much addicted to the use of 
the brewed and distilled drinks, have come 
to the conclusion which they are willing to 
state, that prohibition was a beneficent 
thing even for them, because it has made 
very difficult the acquisition by them of the 
means wherewith to satisfy their destruc¬ 
tive thirst. 

When those who now seenLto be unmind¬ 
ful of the obligations of their citizenship, 
and many of whom are of the so-called 


Prohibition 


21 


“better classes,” shall cease to encourage 
disobedience to law, and shall cease to 
violate the prohibition statutes, and have 
awakened to a realization of the enormity 
of the offense, and shall, as good citizens, 
uphold the law and cooperate in its enforce¬ 
ment, and be properly ashamed of them¬ 
selves for the violation of their duties as 
citizens, then will the enforcement of the 
prohibition statutes become thoroughly 
effective, and the disregard for all law 
which has been born to some extent at 
least of the disregard of law, embodied in 
the prohibition statutes, in higher places, 
be commensurately diminished and the 
country become again a body of citizens, 
with respect for the law, as preservation 
and peace and prosperity demand. 

Dr. Harvey W. Wiley, well known 
everywhere, declares: 

I have not changed my mind in regard to 
prohibition. I am unalterably opposed to 
a resumption of the liquor traffic, even the 
reentry of light wines and beer. I think 
beer is probably the most dangerous to 
health of all the pure ordinary alcoholic 
liquors. I do not know anybody that 
favors the return of the saloon, and beer 
without a distributor is a useless commod¬ 
ity, and with a distributor it is a dangerous 
commodity. 

I have not had much opportunity to 
study the effect of prohibition on the labor¬ 
ing man. I regret that officially labor is 
opposed to prohibition, yet no class of 
citizens are so benefited by prohibition as 
the laboring class. What the laboring man 
does with the savings on beer and whisky 
I am unable to say, but a very right thing 
would be better clothes, better food, better 
schools for his children, and less labor and 
worry for his wife. 

I have not seen a single drunken man in 
Washington since prohibition went into 
effect. There is not so much drunkenness, 
at least openly, by any means as before, 
but what there is is more deadly. The 
bootlegging industry will gradually kill 
itself by killing off all its patrons. This 
is heroic treatment, but probably deserved. 

My sincere conviction is that the eco¬ 
nomic value of prohibition is so great that 


no effort on the part of the laboring men or 
would-be drinkers will ever be able to 
restore the old conditions. 

From the point of view of public health 
prohibition has been a wonder worker. 
I am not a believer in the use of distilled 
spirits as a remedy. Alcohol is never a 
stimulant, but always a narcotic. My 
belief is that the death rate in such 
diseases as pneumonia and influenza is 
much higher where alcohol is used as an 
internal remedy than where it is not. 
Long since the medical profession has 
ceased to regard alcohol in some of its 
beverage forms as a remedy for tuber¬ 
culosis, and it is now practically the uni¬ 
versal belief that it is on the other hand 
an aid to speedy dissolution. 

Dr. Rockwell H. Hunt, Director of 
the College of Commerce and Dean of 
the Graduate School of the University 
of Southern California, fearlessly ex¬ 
presses his opinion and experience: 

I am still as thoroughly opposed to the 
liquor traffic in the United States as before 
the enactment of the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment,—and for the same reasons. 

The liquor traffic was long before the bar 
of civilization. As a problem of first 
magnitude it was compelled to submit to 
the scrutiny of all who would make in¬ 
quisition. An impressive procession of 
investigators, including biologist and chem¬ 
ist, pathologist and eugenist, economist 
and sociologist, business man and labor 
leader, moralist and religionist,—and all 
the rest,—probed the problem from every 
angle. The evidence was in. The day of 
reckoning came. The verdict “guilty, as 
charged,” was entered. 

The desperate effort to evade the sen¬ 
tence would be ludicrous if it were not so 
dastardly and anarchistic. The spirit of 
outlawry exhibited confirms the verdict 
reached and gives additional reason for 
exacting the full penalty. 

In spite of exhibitions of lawlessness 
here and there, the beneficent effects of 
prohibition are being felt more and more. 
Literally millions of persons have quietly 
given up drink altogether, thus adding to 
their happiness and prosperity. The Amer- 


n 


The Annals of the American Academy 


ican saloon, with its baneful “treating” 
habit and all evil concomitants,—malig¬ 
nant cancer that it was,—has been cut 
out of our body politic. Best of all, a 
generation of American boys and girls are 
growing up in our midst who will soon come 
to maturity without the taint of alcohol. 

Candor compels the fair-minded to ad¬ 
mit that prohibition is already a great 
though not perfect success. Dr. William 
H. Welch, Irving Fisher, George Kneeland, 
George Elliott Howard, Professor Kraepe- 
lin, and their coadjutors were right from 
their various standpoints. 

The insistent demand for national pro¬ 
hibition was a just demand, strictly in the 
interests of prosperity and civilization. 
But a few years are only as a day in the 
life of a great nation, a mere fleeting mo¬ 
ment of time in the history of the race. 
Let us never surrender the benefits derived 
from the banishment of King Alcohol; but 
above all, let us hold fast to the faith that 
will bring permanent blessing to posterity. 

R. H. Scott, Vice-President and 
General Manager of the Reo Motor 
Car Co., Lansing, Michigan, speaks 
freely: 

I am still opposed to the traffic in intox¬ 
icating liquors and after several years’ ex¬ 
perience with local option, state-wide and 
national prohibition, I am convinced more 
than ever that there is no place in our Amer¬ 
ican life for the saloon. Its evil influence 
is too well known to need any discussion at 
this time. Early in life I learned first¬ 
hand the effects of intoxicating liquors upon 
my fellow men, and in the shops where I 
was employed I have seen many young men 
with a bright future before them go down 
to ruin on account of drunkenness. 

Since prohibition went into effect we do 
not see drunken men on our streets; neither 
do we hear of drunken men abusing their 
wives and children. 

Under the open saloon plan, large num¬ 
bers of our employees would be absent 
from one to three days following each pay 
day. This left many machines standing 
idle, and disorganized our production to 
such an extent that provision had to be 
made to make up for the inefficiency of the 
employees who were absent on account of 


drunkenness. This added an extra cost to 
manufacturing both from the slowing up of 
production, and a lowering of the quality 
of work produced. 

It also meant a great loss of income to 
the workman and his family. Money 
formerly spent in the saloons is now spent 
for the necessities of life. I believe the 
United States of America was very fortu¬ 
nate in having prohibition following the 
war, as one can imagine the effect the open 
saloon would have under existing condi¬ 
tions. 

The Eighteenth Amendment is not en¬ 
forced 100 per cent; neither is any other 
law in the United States, and if prohibition 
is as much of a failure as the liquor in¬ 
terests would make us believe, we cannot 
understand why there should be any de¬ 
mand for the return of the saloon. There 
are no more bootleggers in the United 
States today than there were during the 
time of the licensed saloon, and the number 
is growing less. If the citizens of the 
United States would demand that the 
Constitution be upheld, and that those who 
are un-American enough to disregard our 
Constitution were given the treatment 
they deserve, if w r ould not be long before 
there would be just as much respect for the 
Eighteenth Amendment as there is for any 
other part of the Constitution of the United 
States of America. 

James Logan, Mayor of Worcester, 
Massachusetts, from 1908 to 1911, 
gives a breezy and pungent message: 

After the passage of the Prohibition 
Amendment to the Constitution some of the 
zealous prohibition advocates evidently 
expected the Millennium. I w^as not one of 
those. Considering the entrenched posi¬ 
tion of the liquor interests, the result of 
years of organization, even the dawn of the 
Millennium was not to be expected. 

On the other hand, it was to be expected 
that the liquor interests would do all in 
their powder to discredit the Amendment and 
discredit all attempts to enforce thenew law. 
Breaking the law is no new thing, for many 
in that aggregation have in the main been 
consistent lawbreakers from the start. 
Give the prohibition amendment a 
chance, with proper enforcement of the 


Prohibition 


23 


law, and in my opinion no man who has 
the best interests of our country at heart 
would consider for a moment going back 
to the old conditions. 

For the past year I have heard more 
prating about the failure of prohibition 
from men who wanted to have it a failure 
than from all others combined. 

Now in closing, may I say the so-called 
‘‘best people” who brag about being able 
to buy “a quart of Scotch,” etc., are 
breakers of the law and in the bootlegging 
class themselves. 

The buyer is not one whit more respect¬ 
able than the seller. It is 50-50. 

The banks know facts. Bird W. 
Spencer, President of The Peoples’ 
Bank and Trust Company of Passaic, 
New Jersey, speaks with authority: 

I live in a manufacturing community, 
have a large number of manufacturers as 
customers, and I know it to be a fact that 
prohibition has improved the mental, 
moral and physical condition of the opera¬ 
tives in our mills. 

I know it also to be a fact that a great 
deal of the money that was spent in saloons 
is now deposited in the savings accounts of 
the various banks. I know this also to be a 
fact, that the savings deposits of the banks 
in this city increased last year one and one- 
half millions of dollars. 

I think there are a large number of cases 
of drunkenness because of the fact that the 
bootlegging rum, which is now sold, produces 
a species of intoxication which is very differ¬ 
ent from the old effect. 

I believe that with proper enforcement of 
the Eighteenth Amendment, bootlegging 
can be prevented and cases of drunkenness 
largely eliminated. I have had personal 
interviews with a large number of women, 
who have opened savings accounts, and in 
almost every instance, have learned that 
the money came from the head of the family 
for the purpose of thrift, in preference to 
spending it in the saloon. 

And William S. Witham, who has 
organized 150 banks ip the South, all 
in successful operation, observes: 

I find, upon investigation, that 90 per 
cent of our people have at last placed 


“Liquor” IN THE MAD DOG CLASS. 
You know what that means. I am person¬ 
ally opposed to the return of the liquor 
traffic. 

The only thing that hinders “LABOR’’ 
from being the greatest beneficiary of pro¬ 
hibition is that “LABOR” has never 
learned the lesson of FRUGALITY. Their 
savings from former barroom traffic has 
given fully 75 per cent of them the chance 
to—“Own a Home,” but “Thrift” is not 
appreciated. Prohibition has done its part 
well—you know that. 

Since prohibition came, the pay envelope 
has gone to the wives and children of men 
who heretofore threw it on the counter of 
the flannel-mouth liquorite. 

As to drunkenness—I travel a great deal 
throughout the Southern States, and I can 
safely say that I have not seen two drunken 
men where at least fifty before prohibition 
disgraced our thoroughfares. If the courts 
would only stop licensing the bootlegger by 
the punishment of only a fine, and add to 
his penalty the “rock pile” service, prohi¬ 
bition officers would then have very little to 
do. Inadequate punishment is a great 
hindrance to law enforcement. It is a poor 
policy to swap public morals for public 
money. 

I do not expect the return of the saloon, 
for liquor traffic has been hung by a rope 
made out of three strands: Christian 
Citizenship, Business and Science. 

But why continue? These men, 
and hundreds like them whom we 
might quote from the Manufacturers’ 
Record, give testimony from Maine to 
Florida and from the Atlantic to the 
Pacific. Surely no amount of “a 
; priori ” (or “a posteriori ”!) reasoning 
can weigh against testimony as to 
what prohibition has already accom¬ 
plished, in spite of lawlessness and 
opposition in high places and in low. 
We may close our quotations with 
these splendid words of Dr. E. E. 
Montgomery of Philadelphia, well 
known and loved: 

In spite of the difficulty of enforcing the 
law against the manufacture and sale of 
intoxicating liquors, I am more than ever 


The Annals of the American Academy 


convinced of the wisdom of the enforcement 
of the Act. 

Its opponents are loud in their vocifera¬ 
tions against the failure to enforce the law 
and in the assertion that more drinking is 
being done, but, only those who do not wish 
to see are convinced by these statements. 

No longer is it necessary to maintain 
wards in hospitals for the treatment of the 
victims of alcohol and those who walk the 
streets are impressed with the infrequency 
of drunken men. The situation would 
render them particularly noticeable were 
they frequent. 

What is needed is continued education, 
so that the young may feel that in indulgence 
they are not only imperiling their future 
health and comfort, but are placing them¬ 
selves outside the pale of respectability. 

I do not believe there is anything like the 
suffering under present conditions that there 
would be were the saloons open as before the 
passage of the Eighteenth Amendment. 

In April, 1922, it was stated in 
Washington that there had been a de¬ 
crease in drunkenness during 1921 of 
50 per cent. The statement reads: 

Any policy of government relating to the 
liquor traffic, which materially decreases 
drunkenness, is tending in the right direction. 
In making comparisons, the last full “wet ” 
year, 1917, is used to compare with 1921, 
unless some other year is more typical. 

The high tide of drunkenness in a few 
places was reached in 1918. In 1917 Boston 
had 72,897 arrests for drunkenness; in 
1921, 30,987. The total for 1920 and 1921 
combined is less than that for any full 
single license year. In 1918 Cincinnati 
had 14,070 arrests for drunkenness; in 
1921 something over 500. In Milwaukee 
drunkenness, drunk and disorderly conduct 
combined, gave these figures: 4,738 in 
191 /, 3,385 in 1921. The arrests for drunk¬ 
enness in 1917 in St. Louis were 4,958; in 
1921, 993. In Washington, D. C., from 
November, 1917, to November, 1918, the 
arrests for drunkenness numbered 10,793; 
during the fiscal year ending July 1, 1921, 
the number was 5,765. 

The official records of New York City 
give the number of arrests for intoxication 


in 1917 as 13,844. In 1921 the arrests for 
this cause were 6,247. 

The police records of Cheyenne, Wyo- 
m i n £> present the following comparison be¬ 
tween “wet” and “dry” years: 

1917 1921 

Arrests for drunkenness. 907 150 

Arrests for disorderly conduct 849 211 
Aggregate for all crimes. 3,072 1,341 

The population of San Francisco, Cal¬ 
ifornia, increased about 10 per cent from 
1916 to 1921, but the arrests for drunken¬ 
ness decreased from 15,106 to 5,530. These 
cases cited from different sections of the 
country are typical. 

Comparing the last “wet” year with 
1921, we find a decrease of approximately 
50 per cent in the arrests for drunkenness. 
This is a striking contrast to the condi¬ 
tions in countries like England, where the 
official report filed with Parliament 
showed an increase in the convictions for 
drunkenness in 1920 of 65.26 per cent, 
and where Dr. Templeman, Surgeon of 
Police, reports 461 cases which have come 
under his observation, where little children 
or babies were killed by being overlaid by 
mothers too drunk to even hear their pitiful 
cries. 

Prohibition Here to Stay 

We may conclude with a few posi¬ 
tive statements: First, in spite of all 
difficulties, and in spite of opposition 
from “high” and “low” bootleggers, 
the struggle for prohibition has been 
a success. 

Second, there is no likelihood of any 
repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment 
or of any change in the Volstead Act, 
unless there comes a revolution in the 
United States as daring as that in 
Russia. 

Ihird, it behooves all who count 
themselves as American citizens to 
uphold, and to demand that others 
uphold, the law .of the land. 

And fourth, we can prophecy that 
^*^1^ years from now the young people 
of America will wonder how the coun- 




Prohibition 


25 


try managed to keep moral and pros¬ 
perous, when brewers and saloon keep¬ 
ers and their supporters held such 
powerful sway in the early part of the 
20th century, just as we wonder how 
it was possible for negro slavery to 
exist one hundred years ago and yet 


the United States hold her place in 
civilization. 

There is an evolution in personal 
and national life which is inevitable 
since there is a God of righteousness 
Who rules in the affairs of men, how¬ 
ever slow the process may be. 


Our Experiment in National Prohibition 

What Progress Has It Made? 

By W. H. Stayton 

The Association Against the Prohibition Amendment 


National vs. State Prohibition 

ROHIBITIONISTS, in answer to 
the accusation that advantage 
was taken of war-time fervor to pro¬ 
cure the adoption of the Eighteenth 
Amendment without adequate public 
discussion, reply that “prohibition” in 
the United States is not an experiment 
and resulted from no sudden movement, 
but from a gradual growth through 
half a century. Even if the reply were 
accurate, it would still fail to meet the 
charge. For, until the outbreak of the 
World War, the only prohibition known 
in this country was state or district 
prohibition — something resting on 
home rule and local self-government. 
National prohibition, regularly submit¬ 
ted to the voters at presidential elections, 
had never registered as many as 300,000 
supporters. State prohibition laws, 
however, were well known and in some 
states were favored by a majority of 
the voters. 

To say that because STATE prohibi¬ 
tion laws were favorably known , there¬ 
fore, NATIONAL prohibition was wise 
or proper , is obviously a mere assump¬ 
tion. 

Governors, elected by the citizens of 
the respective states, are well and 
favorably known, but it may safely be 
predicted that a proposal to national¬ 
ize governorships and to send out our 
governors from Washington to the 
states, would, if calmly discussed in 
peace times, be rejected. 

State prohibition laws had been tried 


out and were understood; they were 
fairly well obeyed and respected,— 
about as other laws were; they required 
for their execution no separate and ex¬ 
pensive enforcement divisions, but 
were administered by the regular 
judicial and police forces; they brought 
no great scandals, and were reasonably 
free from corrupting effects. None of 
these things can, as yet, fairly be said 
for the Volstead Act. 

National prohibition was and is an 
experiment and the enforcement legis¬ 
lation was and is based not on calm 
study of history, but upon associations 
apt to distort the vision. The authors 
of this legislation knew the evils of 
excesses—of intemperance—saw the 
effects visible in the streets and the 
police court; but to be familiar with ef¬ 
fects is not a sufficient equipment for 
grappling with causes. Contemplation 
of the devastation caused by a flood 
and an earnest desire to remedy it do 
not qualify anyone to undertake the 
task. The emotional spectator, with¬ 
out knowledge, thinks it quite simple. 
“The river must be stopped,” he says 
decisively, and cannot understand that 
anyone should oppose such an obvious 
solution except from sheer love of floods. 
But the engineer does not see it in 
the same light; he knows that there 
must first be made a study of the flood’s 
sources, and of the practicability of con¬ 
trolling its power. He sees that to 
recklessly dam the stream may first de¬ 
stroy the districts above, and then 
overwhelm those below the barrier. 



26 




Our Experiment in National Prohibition 


27 


No Study Made of Prior 
Prohibition Failures 

No such study was made by our leg¬ 
islatures in the case of national prohi¬ 
bition. The measures adopted came 
more from hearts than from heads. We 
seemed not to know that a thousand 
years ago our ancestors were perplexed 
by this same problem, when King 
Edgar, at the instance of Dunstan, 
made the first attempt (and failure) of 
sobriety by Act of Parliament. For 
ten centuries efforts in the same direc¬ 
tion have been tried, and much has 
been accomplished by the nations wise 
enough to profit from experience. The 
available literature on the subject is 
vast—one specialized library in Boston 
containing six thousand volumes. All 
of this gathered wisdom was overlooked 
by heated zeal. None stopped even to 
read the one great, unbiased, scientific 
study of prior prohibition experiments 
in our own country. Yet, how prophet¬ 
ic of the ills which now beset us was 
its warning, 

There have been concomitant evils of 
prohibitory legislation. The efforts to en¬ 
force it during forty years past have had 
some unlooked-for effects on public respect 
for courts, judicial procedure, oaths, and 
law in general, and for officers of the law, 


legislators and public servants. The pub¬ 
lic have seen law defied, a whole generation 
of habitual lawbreakers schooled in eva¬ 
sion and shamelessness, courts ineffective 
through fluctuations of policy, delays, per¬ 
juries, negligences, and other miscarriages 
of justice, officers of the law double-faced 
and mercenary, legislators timid and in¬ 
sincere, candidates for office hypocritical 
and truckling, and officeholders unfaithful 
to pledges and to reasonable public expec¬ 
tation. Through an agitation which has 
always had a moral end, these immoral¬ 
ities have been developed and made conspic¬ 
uous. 

Restriction Succeeded : 

Prohibition Never 

The lesson to be learned from a 
study of the prohibition experiments, 
legislation and history of former peri¬ 
ods, is that “regulation and restriction 
have usually succeeded, but prohibi¬ 
tion never has.” 

After three years of experience, not 
of regulation, but of laws which abso¬ 
lutely prohibit, Americans may well 
ask what progress we are making, and 
whether we are succeeding where other 
nations have failed. 

(1) Have the national prohibition 
laws accomplished their purpose? 

(2) What benefits have they brought 
in their train? 

(3) What evils? 


I. HAVE THE LAWS ACCOMPLISHED THEIR PURPOSE? 


The intent of the framers of the 
Eighteenth Amendment and the En¬ 
forcement Act was to (a) stop the use, 
etc., of alcoholic liquors as beverages in 
the United States, (b) permit their use 
in medicine, (c) save those American 
weaklings accustomed to become drunk 
and commit excesses, and (d) end the 
saloon and saloon conditions. 

(a) It is obvious to all that the 
manufacture and use of alcoholic bever¬ 
ages have not been stopped. Since the 
manufacture is now secret and con¬ 


cealed, guesses only, and not facts, ar e 
available as to whether the actual 
quantity now consumed is greater or 
less than in pre-prohibition days. 

Both sides rely upon court statistics 
for support of their opposing conten¬ 
tions. But what statistics shall we 
accept? Some cities, such as Rich¬ 
mond, Virginia, were “dry” long before 
1920, and the bootlegging and moon¬ 
shine gangs were organized and ready 
for the Volstead Law. The prospec¬ 
tive bootleggers of Providence, R. I., 





28 


The Annals of the American Academy 


were, however, taken by surprise. We 
might, therefore, expect that the court 
statistics of Richmond would remain 
about stable and that Providence 
would show increasing opportunities 
for drunkenness after the lawbreaking 
forces, born of prohibition, should 
learn their evil trade. And, in fact, for 
the three years, 1920, 1921 and 1922, 
Richmond’s arrests for drunkenness 
remained substantially constant at 
2,848, 2,565 and 2,638, while those of 
Providence were 2,667, 3,779 and 4,330. 
To get a fair statistical picture, there¬ 
fore, we should take a large number of 
cities. Judge William N. Gemmill, an 
ardent prohibitionist, published in 
June, 1923, statistics collected by him, 
covering eighty cities. We are here 
concerned only with his figures bearing 
on drunkenness, and with those only, 
to know whether prohibition is gain¬ 
ing or losing ground in its race with 
inebriety. 

The Judge’s figures show that in his 
chosen cities the arrests for drunkenness 
in the first year of the national prohibi¬ 
tion law totalled 151,022. We may 
take this figure as a standard. Is 
drunkenness increasing or decreasing? 
In the next year, Judge Gemmill’s 
figures show (in the same cities) 183,876 
arrests and in the third year 243,662 
arrests for the same offense. 

Obviously not only has the national 
prohibition law failed in its purpose to 
stop drunkenness (for in only 80 of our 
many cities 243,662 persons were 
caught so drunk as to be arrested) but 
under the law, in two years, public 
drunkenness has shown a shocking 60 
per cent increase. 

The health statistics show the same 
progressive increase of evils under 
prohibition. Thus, the Metropolitan 
Life Insurance Company, with about 
27,000,000 policies in force and carry¬ 
ing insurance on the lives of one sixth of 
our citizens, reports that in 1922 the 


deaths from alcoholism were more than 
double those in 1921—the actual in¬ 
crease being 133 per cent without in¬ 
cluding wood alcohol poisonings. And 
these statistics deal not with idlers or 
criminals, but with that thrifty class 
which carries life insurance. The 
prohibitionists proclaimed that by 
their panacea the health of this par¬ 
ticular class of citizens w T ould be aided 
and their savings increased. Instead, 
however, prohibition has brought them 
death by poison. 

(b) The administration of the law— 
apparently against the intent of its 
framers—has interfered with the le¬ 
gitimate and legal use of alcohol in 
medicine. Let us take, for example, 
the case of a woman, old, ill and poor; 
if, for her, whisky is prescribed by a 
physician, under wholly legal and 
approved conditions, she must pay at 
the rate of about twelve dollars per 
quart for a legally permitted medicine 
—and at least ten dollars of this amount 
is in effect an unfair fine. 

(c) Has the law succeeded in saving 
the weakling from temptation? Con¬ 
ditions vary throughout the country. 
Certainly it is the fact that in many 
places—probably in all the cities—the 
man who is so weak or diseased as to 
be unable to control his thirst may 
still find illegitimate “hootch.” The 
principal change in conditions is that 
he now pays much more for a quart 
than he formerly did, and all too 
frequently gets something which, in¬ 
stead of sending him home drunk, sends 
him to the morgue or to a hospital, to be 
treated, at the expense of the taxpayer, 
for blindness, insanity or some other 
permanent affliction. 

(d) Has the saloon been abolished? 
Many, undoubtedly, of the supporters 
of the prohibition movement believed 
that they were crusading against the 
saloon and nothing more. The very 
name “Anti-Saloon League” encour- 


Our Experiment in National Prohibition 


29 


aged that belief. The legalized saloon 
is gone, and the assumption of a fear 
that any amendment of the Volstead 
Act will lead to its return is not to be 
taken seriously. The people are sub¬ 
stantially unanimous in their opposi¬ 
tion to the old conditions, and the sup¬ 
position that the old saloon can return 
and exist against this solid popular 
wish is preposterous. 

But, in our just indignation against 
the old saloon, we were never very 
certain whether our wrath was aroused 
by the place itself, or by the owner and 
barkeeper, or by the people who as¬ 
sembled there, or the things they did 
there. We have put the owner and the 
barkeeper out of business, with few to 
mourn their going. But the objection¬ 
able people who formerly met in the 
barroom are still living and meeting and 
doing much as they did before. The 
place of the old authorized saloon has 
been taken by the crooked “soft- 
drink” dive. There are more of them 
than there ever were saloons. The 
people, the surrounding conditions, and 


the things done and permitted are 
about the same as of old. The differ¬ 
ence is that the old place was on a 
front street where it could be observed, 
restricted and regulated, while the new 
one is secretly located in a back alley 
and is unregulated and exists by law¬ 
less methods. The daily police re¬ 
ports of raids on these dens make the 
proof of their existence and ubiquity 
quite unnecessary. 

It seems, then, that the one thing 
which the people were a unit in desiring 
—the destruction of the saloon—has 
not been attained. The fable of the 
greedy dog trying to seize the meat 
from his own reflection was forgotten. 
Had the Anti-Saloon League confined 
itself to the mission indicated by its 
name, we should now be rid of the 
saloon, but in the effort to grab too 
much, the real prize floated away on 
the current of public resentment. 

It cannot, therefore, be fairly claimed 
that national prohibition has brought 
those blessings for which its advocates 
hoped. 


II. WHAT BENEFITS HAVE NATIONAL PROHIBITION LAWS 

BROUGHT IN THEIR TRAIN? 


The banking reports show in some 
places an increase in savings accounts, 
and while a part of this may be fairly 
attributed to raises in wage rates, some 
of the credit is due to prohibition. But 
it may properly be pointed out that 
this result might have been accom¬ 
plished through state or local prohibi¬ 
tion without bringing to the nation the 
disorders and dangers which accompany 
Volsteadism. 

In many instances drinking has de¬ 
creased among those poor persons who 
formerly drank sparingly but can no 
longer afford to drink at all. But 
state or local prohibition might equally 
well have brought the same conditions; 
and it may be doubted whether the 


poor man’s lot has been really improved 
by forcefully stopping him from spend¬ 
ing a part of his earnings on what 
seemed to him an innocent pleasure for 
which he paid a labor equivalent. 

That national prohibition, then, has 
been in some respects beneficial is not 
to be denied, but it has brought in its 
train collateral and concomitant evils 
little foreseen by the prohibitionists, 
but now known to be fraught with 
grave dangers. It is the wish of good 
citizens to fairly weigh these matters and 
determine whether the nation can afford 
to bear the evils for the sake of thfe bene¬ 
fits. Let us, then, consider in succes¬ 
sion some of the misfortunes which 
accompany our prohibition experiment. 


30 


The Annals of the American Academy 
III. SOME OF THE EVILS OF VOLSTEADISM 


Effect Upon our Government 

First, is the effect upon our Govern¬ 
ment—as distinguished from the ef¬ 
fects on individuals. President Har¬ 
ding recognized both the existence and 
the gravity of this danger when, re¬ 
cently, in a public speech he pointed out 
that the prohibitionists had “sought by 
law” to remove strong drink as a curse 
upon the American “citizen,” and then 
solemnly added that we must now 
recognize that the problem involves 
“a menace to the Republic itself.” 

The President may have differed from 
others as to the remedy to be applied, 
but he was alive to the danger; and 
yet what shall it profit us if we reform 
the habits of some drunkards and lose 
the Republic? 

And what, specifically, is the danger? 

Probably, even on Thanksgiving 
Day, this generation has forgotten to 
render gratitude for the atmospheric 
oxygen on which our mortal lives de¬ 
pend and for the Constitution which is 
equally the source of our national ex¬ 
istence. But let the oxygen supply be 
but briefly interrupted and there loom 
visions of the black hole of Calcutta. 
Like results will inevitably follow, 
nationally, if we abstract from the 
Constitution its vital principle. That 
Constitution, founded by the people of 
the several states, created for their 
purposes a piece of governmental 
machinery to be located in Washing¬ 
ton. But that federal machine was to 
be the servant, not the master of the 
people. It was ordained to receive and 
obey instructions, not to say to its 
masters, “Thou shalt not!” Today 
our former servant rules—arrogantly 
rules—in our house. 

Americans, thanks to the wisdom and 
determination of their forefathers, 
have been so prosperous and happy 
that they are slow to believe that 
serious governmental evils may come 


to them. Yet it is evident that in these 
days we are beginning to talk more of 
the Declaration of Independence and 
to reflect upon the similarity of our 
present situation and our ancestors’ 
complaint that the Government had 
“erected a multitude of new offices 
and sent hither swarms of officers to 
harass our people and eat out their 
substance.” 

Those who see in the federal en¬ 
croachments, growing out of national 
prohibition, a danger to the Republic 
itself may well ponder on John Fiske’s 
warning: 

If the day should ever arrive (which, 
God forbid) when the people of the different 
parts of our country shall allow their local 
affairs to be administered by prefects sent 
out from Washington, and when the self- 
government of the states shall have been 
so far lost as that of the departments of 
France, or even so far as that of the counties 
of England—on that day the progressive 
political career of the American people will 
have come to an end. 

The federal Government was created 
to deal with only those functions w T hich 
could not well be handled by a single 
state. International affairs were a fit 
subject for federal power, as were such 
matters as interstate commerce, affect¬ 
ing more than one state. But the very 
spirit of the Constitution was that each 
state should forever keep power over 
its local affairs. This spirit has been 
destroyed by the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment, under which the right of local 
self-government is torn from the in¬ 
dividual states, whose people are made 
subject, even in the small routine 
affairs of their daily lives, to those liv¬ 
ing in far distant localities and under 
other conditions. 

And this brings us to a vital point, 
going to the very foundations of federa¬ 
tions such as ours. A geographically 
small country with a homogeneous 
population may endure sumptuary 


Our Experiment in National Prohibition 


31 


laws which are uniform through the 
land. But the United States, with its 
northermost point far up in the Arctic, 
stretches through the temperate zone, 
thence through the northern tropics, 
past the Equator and deep into the 
southern tropics, and from east to west 
we extend more than half way around 
the earth. We have become a huge 
country embracing vast climatic 
ranges, and including in the Union 
people of divers origins, differing 
physically and in faiths, thoughts and 
habits. 

Obviously, to hold such dissimilar 
groups in happy combination, there 
must be the fullest practicable measure 
of local self-government and personal 
liberty, and there must be tolerance and 
toleration, w a kindly national spirit of 
give and take. For any one sect or 
section to impose by force its sump¬ 
tuary views, however worthy, upon 
those of different thought must neces¬ 
sarily lead to misunderstandings, setting 
class against class, and tend toward 
disintegration. Cool-headed Amer¬ 
icans can hardly fail to see today the 
operation of this tendency. 

Those dwelling in large cities and 
trying earnestly to solve the pressing 
problems of life under hive conditions 
feel that impracticable regulations 
have been forced upon them through 
the vote of those living in rural com¬ 
munities and happily unable to hear 
nature’s cry from the crowded tene¬ 
ment. Nor is the city man unaware 
that, while the Enforcement Division 
denies him even his mild beverages, 
yet it, relying upon the rural vote for 
support, has failed to issue like regula¬ 
tions for the country districts, and 
continues to permit the farmer to 
have his hard cider, his home-made 
wines and his fermented juices. Thus 
is , enmity born between rural and 
urban brothers, and thoughtful citi¬ 
zens may well take heed now lest 


retaliations follow when comes the 
inevitable day in which the city vote 
will be in the majority. 

Poor vs. Rich 

Even greater is that menace of Vol- 
steadism which set the poor against the 
rich and gave the laborer a just cause 
of grievance against his employer. 
This antagonism rests on two facts, one 
having to do with the law’s origin and 
the other with its enforcement. 

First, the workman has long believed 
that the campaign for national prohi¬ 
bition was financed by the employer 
for the purpose of increasing output. 
In the language of the factory ‘'it was 
done to exploit labor.” At first this 
was merely a suspicion, but the Ander¬ 
son revelations in New York estab¬ 
lished the fact that the Rockefellers 
had secretly been heavy contributors 
to the Anti-Saloon League’s fund, and 
this was enough to justify in the 
worker’s mind all past suspicions and 
to breed a horde of new ones. So 
gravely philosophical a paper as the 
Villager assures the laborer that 

It was to make sure of industrial tee- 
totalism that the country now has pro¬ 
hibition. ... It was the industrial 
movement which made use of the moral 
movement, and so achieved the Eighteenth 
Amendment. 

Second, the laborer knows that rich 
men, including the factory owners and 
executives with whom he comes in 
contact, have not ceased to drink per¬ 
sonally. Naturally, properly and with 
instinctive love of liberty, the worker 
resents the situation. However tem¬ 
perate his prior habits may have been, 
he is now denied one of his pleasures 
and relaxations. Futher, he knows 
that nature herself has decreed that he 
who, pent in by brick walls, performs 
hard physical labor is refreshed by 
mild beverages. He feels a craving not 
for an intoxicant, but for a stimulant, 


32 


The Annals of the American Academy 


and lie knows that while this is denied 
him, the very employer who clandes¬ 
tinely paid to bring about this imposi¬ 
tion is himself enjoying all his old lib¬ 
erties. Worse still, the poor man 
knows that when his wife or children 
are ill, they suffer or perhaps die for 
lack of that which is to the employer 
and his pocketbook a mere bootlegging 
transaction in cynical disregard of the 
law he helped to make. 

Confiscation 

To many, the employers seem to be 
singularly blind in their attitude toward 
some of the Volstead Act's provisions. 
Surely that class of our citizens who 
should be most concerned to fight 
against laws confiscating private prop¬ 
erty is the employer class. Yet their 
law—the Volstead Law—is a confisca¬ 
ting statute. A few years ago a barrel 
of whisky was private property; ob¬ 
jectionable property if you will, but 
property none-the-less, manufactured 
under Government supervision, gauged, 
stamped and taxed by federal officers. 
So, breweries and distilleries and their 
contained machinery were private 
property, duly recognized and taxed. 
Then came forward people saying, “We 
do not approve that kind of property; 
we think it works harm to the people; 
and because we do not approve it, we 
demand that it be confiscated,” and in 
effect, confiscated it was. 

But there are many people in this 
country who do not approve accum¬ 
ulated or inherited fortunes, believing 
them to be harmful to the people; in¬ 
deed, some of those among us do not 
approve any kind of private ownership. 
When the time comes that these classes 
demand confiscations to suit their 
beliefs, the employers will be in no 
position to turn to the working man 
for help in sustaining property rights; 
for the poor man may well reply, “No, 
it was you who made this precedent, 


and you made it for no good purpose, 
but with the intent to rob me of my 
hours of relaxation, so that you might 
get more work and more profit out of 
me.” 

Employers should note that the 
factory poll taken by the Literary 
Digest , as well as the vote of the Unions 
affiliated with the American Federation 
of Labor, show in many trades a practi¬ 
cal unanimity against Volsteadism. 

Let us at least open our eyes and see 
that the age-long fight between Labor 
and Capital has been intensified and 
embittered through national prohibi¬ 
tion—and this to the danger of our 
country. 

Disrespect for Law 

Another collateral result of Volstead¬ 
ism—one utterly unexpected by the 
prohibitionists—is widely manifesting 
itself in disrespect for law, which has 
become so grave* that President Har¬ 
ding called it the “most demoralizing 
factor” in our public life. 

The prohibitionists cry out that the 
people are wrong and should obey the 
law. The people answer that it is the 
law which is wrong, and should be 
changed. Certain it is that either the 
law is wrong and should be changed or 
the people are wrong and should be 
changed. And the voters will sooner 
or later have to decide which of these 
jobs they will undertake. 

Why this law should be held in such 
contempt by people who are otherwise 
law-abiding is still a matter of contro¬ 
versy. Some condemn it for one 
reason, some for another. A leading 
New England newspaper sees in the 
public’s attitude a warning that we 
should “begin a serious study of all 
laws which do not command public 
favor” because in a Republic “a law 
which does not command public sup¬ 
port is not a law—it is a form of tyr¬ 
anny.’ J 



Our Experiment in National Prohibition 


33 


One who studies the psychology of 
the subject is inevitably struck by the 
anomaly that while state prohibition 
laws were generally obeyed and re¬ 
spected, people seem to feel it a sort of 
duty to flout the Volstead Act. And 
inquiry quickly reveals at least one 
reason—a belief that the law was 
passed not by a man’s neighbors, who 
had an interest in him and his affairs, 
but by some one living at a distance, 
by strangers acting in a spirit of 
meddlesomeness. The Marylander is 
quite willing to yield even respect and 
obedience to a law he believes op¬ 
pressive, provided it was passed by his 
own people, but his innate sense of in¬ 
dependence resents the effort of Kan¬ 
sans to impose a law on him through 
what he believes to be a smug piece of 
sanctimonious humbuggery. “ If Kan¬ 
sans,” he says, “want prohibition and 
believe it good for their people, let them 
have it by all means; but why should 
Kansas meddle with Alary land? I am 
not forcing anything on her against her 
will and I’ll not have her force some¬ 
thing on me.” 

No good can come from merely 
berating the public because a law is 
disobeyed. There are two sides to the 
subject. Undoubtedly there is an 
obligation on all of us to obey the law, 
but in a free country there is a corre¬ 
sponding obligation on the part of the 
lawmaking bodies to enact only such 
measures as are fair and reasonable 
and will command the support of pub¬ 
lic opinion. Those lawmakers who 
foisted national prohibition upon us 
committed the first and the great 
wrong, and upon them rests the re¬ 
sponsibility for our present lawlessness. 

One Senator, in warning his colleagues 
of the folly of their proposed course 
said, “I do not think a prohibition 
amendment will be effective. You 
cannot make any law stronger than the 
public sentiment which sees to its 

4 


enforcement.” That Senator was War¬ 
ren G. Harding. 

Official Hypocrisy 

The second obvious factor in creat¬ 
ing the present state of contempt for 
and disobedience to the Volstead Act, 
is found in the public’s knowledge that 
those who drew the law and voted for its 
passage do not even pretend to obey it. 
The specific confession of such “drys” 
as Upshaw make it unnecessary to cite 
cases. People with ideas of liberty are 
not inclined to obey laws confessedly 
hypocritical and concededly passed by 
hypocrites. Indeed, the student of 
government will find in this instance 
something graver than even hypocrisy. 
For our federal officials, even those in 
very high places, do not hesitate to say, 
in effect, “ Yes, I disregard the Volstead 
Act, for I am a gentleman and an 
educated man and I know how to 
drink and when to stop. The law was 
not really intended for such as we are, 
but for the other class of our people, 
and it is for their good to have it.” No 
man knows what may happen in a 
Republic when those who make, ad¬ 
minister and execute the laws have 
come to think of “their people” much 
as they do of “their cattle.” Certainly 
this is not democracy, and certainly the 
“cattle” are going to continue their 
resentfulness and to work for a change. 

The AIisused Slogan of “Law and 
Order” 

For a time it seemed that the Anti- 
Saloon League’s “Law and Order” 
slogan might be sufficiently potent to 
rally a majority of the people to support 
the law so long as it remained on the 
books. But when the conduct of the 
Anti-Saloon League’s officers brought 
them into contact with the law, they 
quickly showed such an evident inten¬ 
tion of disobeying and fighting it that 


34 


The Annals of the American Academy 


their insincerity was publicly manifest 
and the influence of their clever catch 
phrase melted away. Few men were 
willing to be longer duped by Anderson’s 
cry, “Respect for Law,” when he him¬ 
self and the clerical members of his 
Board were refusing to give informa¬ 
tion to the Grand Jury and the duly 
constituted legal authorities of the 
state. Then, when in New York the 
Anti-Saloon League failed to promptly 
and frankly obey the Court’s order to 
file its accounts of receipts and ex¬ 
penditures, the mask of hypocrisy was 
quite torn off; and, unhappily for those 
who believe that all laws should be 
obeyed, there was at once a reaction on 
the part of the deceived. It is un¬ 
fortunate, but it is inevitable, that if 
those who lead a reform movement 
lose the respect of their followers, there 
will come a tidal turn which will in¬ 
jure the movement regardless of its 
merits. 

Before there can again be proper 
respect for law in this country, the 
authorities and the Anti-Saloon League 
must themselves show some of such 
respect. At present they are setting 
the example of disregarding all laws 
and decisions which do not meet their 
approval. The “Search and Seizure” 
laws are notoriously disobeyed by those 
sworn to enforce them and to protect 
public rights. Two federal judges 
have decided that the regulations re¬ 
stricting doctors in their prescriptions 
are unlawful, yet the authorities tyran¬ 
nically refuse to yield obedience and 
continue to violate their oaths and 
oppress the poor and sick. 

Real Temperance Has Been Set 

Back 

It will be remembered that President 
Harding, who had definitely assumed 
the leadership of the National Prohibi¬ 
tion Party, described the “dry” pro¬ 
gram as an effort to remove “strong” 


drink. Yet, oddly enough, these very 
people, in their zeal, went so far beyond 
the proper limit as to defeat their own 
purpose. Doubtless the President was 
right in interpreting public opinion as 
hostile to strong (rather than mild) 
beverages, and as recognizing the fact 
that the first step toward real temper¬ 
ance should be the substitution of mild 
beverages in place of spirits. And this 
very public opinion had, in the course 
of recent history, brought about a 
steady and important growth in this 
substitution. 

In 1850, for example, the national 
per capita consumption of distilled 
spirits was 2| gallons; by 1900 it had 
shrunk to lj gallons; and in 1919 it was 
down to f of a gallon. Malt liquors 
were increasingly used as substitutes. 
The actual amount of alcohol consumed 
(per capita) remained substantially 
constant, but it was taken, progres¬ 
sively, increasingly diluted and in less 
harmful forms. 

This at least meant that drunkenness 
and alcoholic excesses were becoming 
less and less prevalent; and, in this 
respect, popular observation confirmed 
the story told by statistics. All observ¬ 
ant Americans more than 50 years of 
age had, up to 1920, noticed a marked 
national change in the direction of 
sobriety. 

But with the coming of national pro¬ 
hibition, that tendency was reversed. 
Malt liquors were too bulky for the 
bootlegger, and the country has given 
up its cocktails and gone back to 
strong drink taken “straight.” Even 
women and girls drink from the 
bottle. 

The drinking of beer is not, of course, 
abstinence, but it certainly is not in 
conflict with real temperance; and, 
however good the motive, those who 
drive a people from mild to strong 
drinks injure the cause of temperance. 

To this, the prohibitionists reply 


Our Experiment in National Prohibition 


35 


“the responsibility for this state of 
affairs rests not on us, but on those who 
drink in violation of law.” 

Not so. Formerly, a man had, and 
realized that he had, the right of self- 
determination as to drink. He was 
free to take it or refuse it. The moral 
responsibility and the right of choice 
were the individual’s. Now he has 
been deprived of the right of choice. 
Someone else—the lawmakers—have 
assumed the responsibility for deciding 
as to the individual’s conduct. None 
can fail to understand the psychology 
(and the danger) in the reply of a 
half-inebriated clubman who recently, 
rejecting a suggestion that he stop 
drinking and sober up answered, “Speak 
to the enforcement officer about it; it’s 
his job to stop all drinking and I 
assume none of his responsibility.” 

In these unforseen ways, the national 
prohibition law has set back real pro¬ 
hibition for at least a generation. In¬ 
deed, it may develop that the children 
of this generation will drink more than 
did their grandfathers, for today, in 
many homes, the little boys and girls 
(just at the imitative age) watch their 
parents in the home brewing, and know 
to a nicety the proportions of raisins, 
sugar, etc., called for by the favorite 
recipes. 

Our International Standing 

One of the great disappointments— 
one may even say “shocks”—of na¬ 
tional prohibition has been its effect on 
our international reputation. How¬ 
ever much a certain class of speakers 
may boast as to our national omnip¬ 
otence and self-complacency, it remains 
the fact that with nations, as with 
women and men, the respect, friend¬ 
ship and good will of one’s neighbors 
and associates is a precious treasure. 
Indeed, this is more important in the 
case of countries than of individuals, 
for the very peace of the world and the 


ending of wars depend on international 
faith and respect. 

Did any nation ever stand higher in 
the world’s respect than we stood at the 
end of 1918? The other nations said 
that we had saved their very lives, and 
they believed us generous and altru¬ 
istic. 

Why have they cooled and fallen 
away? 

Some say it has to do with the debts, 
but that, while perhaps having some 
effect, is not the whole truth. Prohibi¬ 
tion hypocrisy is in great part to 
blame. 

Frequently one can better judge the 
conduct of a nation by reducing it to 
its simple terms and comparing it to the 
behavior of an individual. Suppose, 
then, that some man had saved your 
life at the risk of his own, and having 
in your moment of despair, treated you 
with unparalleled generosity, and hav¬ 
ing freely given the lives of his sons that 
yours might survive, he should after¬ 
wards differ from you concerning a 
monetary obligation. Could that, by 
any possibility, make you forget his 
sacrifices and his worth and turn 
against him and his? Surely not. 

But if that man should afterwards 
do something hypocritical and dis¬ 
honest, and if he should arrogantly 
claim the right to regulate your private 
affairs, and if he should show a will¬ 
ingness to abandon his chosen moral 
code when there was money to be made 
from the abandonment, then, in sad¬ 
ness, you might turn from him. A 
calm consideration of the facts will 
show that our officials have so acted in 
prohibition matters as to put the na¬ 
tion in just such an unfavorable light; 
and our friends have turned their faces 
because they hold us, as citizens, 
responsible for the acts of our Govern¬ 
ment. 

First, we declared ourselves to be a 
nation of prohibitionists; we tooted our 




36 


The Annals of the American Academy 


moral horn somewhat loudly; then we 
sent our leading pussyfooters to per¬ 
suade the wicked nations to adopt our 
high standard of morals,—this with 
more horn tooting. These acts were 
received abroad with some misgivings 
but with general respect, and certainly 
with a belief in our sincerity. 

But suddenly, we found that our 
national pocketbook was being touched; 
we—that is the taxpayers—owned 
ships and carried passengers on the 
high seas. Passengers wanted to drink 
and were ready to pay for the privilege, 
so our upturned eyes were closed to the 
law and to all of our self-righteous 
protestations, and we went—as a 
nation—into the business of “keeping 
bar” on board our ships for profit. 
But we didn’t adopt the method of the 
crusader conscious of the rectitude of 
his course; we didn’t openly admit at 
home that we had gone into the liquor 
traffic (after all that we had said 
against it); we didn’t openly advertise in 
this country, but ran our ship-bars on 
the confidential lines of our well-known 
national institution—the “Speak- 
Easy.” And when we were caught at 
the game and stopped—with much 
official weeping—our foreign friends 
naturally began to doubt our sincerity, 
to wonder whether we were really as 
much better than they as we claimed 
to be. 

Then leading foreign officials com¬ 
ing to this country in connection with 
postwar adjustments, four-power con¬ 
ferences, etc., were entertained in 
Washington, officially and privately, 
in the presence of our great men of the 
legislative, executive and judicial de¬ 
partments. The guests were amazed 
to learn that between our practice and 
our preaching there stretched the 
broad gulf of national hypocrisy. Our 
visitors saw the things of which Upshaw 
threatened to speak, and they carried 
the truth back to their homes. 


Next came the question of liquor on 
foreign ships casually visiting our 
shores. Our foreign friends believe, as 
most Americans believe, that the 
Eighteenth Amendment was intended 
to apply only to the United States, and 
was not designed to interfere either 
directly or indirectly with a foreigner’s 
life and habits on the high seas under 
his own flag. But our officials would 
not have it so; in vain did the foreigner 
plead that what liquor he had on board 
his ship under seal could not be used 
for “beverage purposes within the 
United States.” We would not listen. 
With attitude of high resolve and stern 
morality, our officials said to all the 
wicked outside world, “No, rum is a 
curse, it shall not enter our waters.” 
And then, to what we may well believe 
was the amazement of the wicked, 
these same officials added; “At least 
you shall not bring that rum into our 
ports where we can’t collect any tribute 
from it; but of course if you want to 
take it through our waters at Panama, 
why we’re ready to let you pass, for we 
have some millions of dollars in tolls at 
stake there and can't afford to let our 
piety stand in the way of profit.” 

So the foreigner—why shouldn’t 
he—has come to think of us as hypo¬ 
crites. All—or at least much—of that 
splendid good will and affection won by 
the work, sacrifice and devotion of our 
women and the blood of our young men 
in the dark days of 1917 and 1918 have 
been frittered away. 

Prohibition has brought in its train 
the loss of America’s precious good 
name and has diminished her influence 
for peace on earth, good will to men. 
In the language of the Boston Herald 
(generally a supporter of national pro¬ 
hibition): “Whatever one’s views are 
regarding prohibition, we ought as a 
people not to make ourselves ridiculous. 
We ought not to be a swaggerer among 
the nations.” 








Our Experiment in National Prohibition 


37 


And well might President Harding 
point out our present course as bring¬ 
ing “disrespect upon our country ” and 
as one to “be pointed to as justifying 
the charge that we are a nation of 
hypocrites. ” 

The Church in Politics 

Probably all agree, at least theoreti¬ 
cally, that liberty is endangered when 
the Church and the State form a part¬ 
nership. 

In this country there has been de¬ 
termined hostility to the Catholics, 
founded on a belief that their priests 
and churches mixed in politics. The 
Protestant churches have claimed 
clean hands in the matter. But na¬ 
tional prohibition has done away with 
this state of affairs. The Anti-Saloon 
League sends its agents and collectors 
into the churches of the younger 
Protestant denominations. These con¬ 
gregations open their pulpits to the 
League’s agent and join with him in 
splitting commissions on the collection. 
The League advertises itself as “The 
Church in Action” and the churches 
acquiesce. 

But the Anti-Saloon League is a 
political organization. Not only is 
this obvious to all open-eyed men, but 
the Supreme Court of New York has 
so decided. Yet these Protestant 
churches continue their participation 
in the partnership. 

The precedent is at least dangerous. 
It may or may not be true, that the 
Catholics have heretofore offended in 
this particular. Certainly they have 
now a vicious precedent ready for use. 
They may choose to go into politics. 
Some sects have succeeded in working 
into our national statutes one clause 
from their book of church discipline. 
Similar efforts may be made hereafter. 
The Catholics and the denominations 
now really opposed to mixing affairs of 
Church and state may be forced to en¬ 


ter politics as a matter of self-protec¬ 
tion, and, whether they go in from 
choice or necessity, the result will be 
evil and the blame must be laid at the 
door of the Protestant prohibitionists. 

Prohibition’s Effect on Industry 

As to the great desirability of stop¬ 
ping the evils flowing from alcoholic 
excesses, all were in accord. Differ¬ 
ences of opinion existed solely as to the 
wisdom and efficacy of the proposed 
remedies. If prohibition had brought 
no accompanying evils, and had proved 
efficacious to the point of accomplish¬ 
ing half the good predicted for it, none 
would regret the monetary cost nor 
cavil at the industrial damage done. 
But when prohibition laws fail, as they 
have failed, to bring either prohibition 
or sobriety, and when they father a 
horde of calamities, one may fairly 
count the financial figures. For a 
moral success, nothing that we pay is 
too much, but for a moral failure, any¬ 
thing we pay is too much. 

We are paying enormously—with 
threats of more to come. Taxes—• 
national, state and municipal—are 
being sacrificed to the extent of a 
billion dollars per year, and bootleggers 
get the money that should go to reduce 
tax-burdens. Millions are being spent 
on an enforcement division, and now 
they say that we must pay one hundred 
millions for an addition needed in New 
York alone. About 146,000 men have 
been thrown out of employment in this 
country and their work is now performed 
by foreigners abroad who are making 
and smuggling into the United States 
the beverages formerly made here. 

If the illegitimate drinks now being 
sold in this country w T ere replaced by 
home manufacture, or if they paid 
legitimate duties, we would need no 
income tax law. 

If the five million acres formerly 
given over to the raising of barley for 


38 


The Annals of the American Academy 


non-intoxicating cereal beverages, now 
prohibited by the Volstead Act, were 
again put to their former use, every 
farmer would get a fairer price for his 
wheat and corn. 

Other Evils 

The subjects here discussed by no 
means exhaust the list of indictments 
against national prohibition. Increase 
in crimes of violence, congestion in the 
courts, sale and use of narcotics, 
violations of civil service principles, 
prostitution of public bureaus to 
political ends, bribery and corruption 
among officials, growth of insanity and 
blindness, the degradation of the auto¬ 
mobile, and the insidious moral dangers 
to which maidens and youths are 
subjected, all deserve more lengthy 
treatment than can here be given 
them. 


Against these we must weigh what¬ 
ever benefits these laws and conditions 
have brought, not neglecting what 
seems likely to be the one lasting bless¬ 
ing for which we must give thanks to 
the prohibitionist,—that is an aroused 
public opinion as to the wdsdom of the 
Fathers and the national necessity of 
returning to the paths they blazed in 
the great Constitution they devised for 
us. Too long we had neglected it, but 
now that violent hands have been laid 
on it, we realize that one sure way to 
destroy the precious document is to 
load it down with unenforceable pro¬ 
visions. Our eyes begin to see again, 
the states begin to resist unwarranted 
aggressions, and women and men are 
aroused to a new individuality and have 
a larger sense of tolerant liberty which 
promises to bring back to the nation 
even more than was lost through our 
negligent good nature. 


The Eighteenth Amendment an Infringement of 

Liberty 

By Hon. Henry S. Priest 
St. Louis Bar 


T HOSE who oppose constitutional 
and statutory prohibition intelli¬ 
gently are not in favor of intemperance. 
There is a vast difference between tee- 
totalism and temperance, between 
sobriety and drunkenness. Constitu¬ 
tional and statutory prohibition aims 
to force the extreme of total abstinence 
in the use of intoxicating beverages. 

It has been a habit of the human 
race to use fermented drinks as bever¬ 
ages from a “time whereof the memory 
of man runneth not to the contrary,” 
and the habit has been quite as general 
as the use of vegetables and meats for 
food. So, it may be said, the appetite 
for fermented juices is a perfectly 
natural one. Like all other natural 
appetites, however, it is often abused. 

Early Voluntary Associations 

I believe it was Dr. Rush who, about 
the time the process of distillation was 
subjected to control for purposes of 
federal taxation, claimed to have dis¬ 
covered that distilled liquors were 
poisonous, whereas fermented ones 
were not,—in which he was mistaken, 
—and this gave rise to literary propa¬ 
ganda against distilled liquors, which 
was the beginning of the temperance 
movement. From then on, the move¬ 
ment spread, always taking the form of 
voluntary associations, meeting with 
varying degrees of success according to 
the fleeting passions of the moment. 
These associations always invited, 
never coerced, membership. They ap¬ 
pealed to individual intelligence and 
conscience. Perhaps the most per¬ 
manent and successful of them is the 


Women’s Christian Temperance Un¬ 
ion. This association and others of 
like purpose, when proselyting and con¬ 
verting only by precept, example and 
persuasion, deserve sympathy and 
encouragement. 

The Anti-Saloon League, with a 
vision of “the flesh pots of Egypt,” 
building upon the work of these Chris¬ 
tian women a huge political organ¬ 
ization for profit and political power, 
has enlisted, by pretenses of goodness 
and altruism, those who were formerly 
moving in a true Christian spirit to 
uplift and regenerate those who abused 
the instincts of nature. 

A Bit of Moralizing 

Seldom do those who meditate a 
wrong upon the liberty of the people 
present it in the repulsive and repellent 
garb of its true character. They clothe 
it in habiliments of morality, philan¬ 
thropy and patriotism. By these dis¬ 
guises, the senses of critical perception 
are deluded and the people are more 
easily led into the shambles of legal 
oppression. 

Intemperance in eating, drinking and 
speaking is a moral defect, but reforms 
in such delinquencies can only come 
from within and can never be forced 
in from without, because that which 
receives and gives them out is mental 
and spiritual, and not material. 

Philosophy embraces two great de¬ 
partments, one abstract and the other 
moral. The latter has two general 
classes: One of which deals with the 
nature of man and his relation to God, 
with which others than the individual 


39 


40 


The Annals of the American Academy 


have no concern except of sympathetic 
interest; the other is concerned only 
with his duty to his fellow beings. 
Moral philosophy has relation to the 
dignity and inviolability of the indi¬ 
vidual. Political philosophy has to do, 
in a legal sense, only with the rights of 
individual man, which is the right to 
life, liberty and property. 

There is, therefore, a vast difference 
between vice and crime. Vice is the 
negation of goodness, unovert in the 
passions and appetites of man, whereas 
the question of crime is only of the fact 
of the rights of the individual. Moral¬ 
ity and law, as commonly understood, 
are entirely different things, though in 
all just laws a moral quality is inherent. 
Morality is the uplifting of man to the 
perfect dignity of manhood. Law is 
definitive of a rule of conduct to insure 
to each person the possession and en¬ 
joyment of his natural right to that 
dignity. Vice is a disregard of moral 
law; crime a disregard of natural rights 
and of that mechanism adopted by 
organized society to secure their enjoy¬ 
ment. 

It is not my purpose to debate or 
make an exposition of the principles of 
moral philosophy, but merely to dis¬ 
tinguish between vice and crime. Gov¬ 
ernments have nothing to do, in their 
proper function, with unovert vice; 
they have only to do with overt crimes, 
which, as I said before, relate purely to 
the recognized rights of the individual. 

We may bear malice towards a 
fellow being. That is a matter be¬ 
tween our conscience and our God, and 
is a sin. But if we express our malice 
in act and take his life, we are guilty of 
murder, by robbing him of that which 
is his by natural right, and society 
punishes the act as a crime. 

If you covet your neighbor’s ox or 
his ass, it is immoral,—a sin that God 
may punish or forgive,—but if you 
capture them, it is then the concern of 


the law, for society is organized to 
protect private property. One can 
lie as lustily as he pleases; it is his con¬ 
cern with God. But if he bears false 
testimony in a court of justice, he in¬ 
jures personal rights and interferes 
with the administration of justice, 
which is a concern of the state, ap¬ 
pointed by freemen to protect the 
natural rights of the individual. You 
may get drunk in the privacy of your 
own home—the freeman’s castle, where 
the king may not enter! It is your sin 
and you ought to get down on your 
knees and pray God to forgive you and 
make you strong to resist the tempta¬ 
tion to abuse a thing good in itself; but 
if you do this in public places, you 
offend against another’s right and you 
should be put in jail for it. You 
should not say to your neighbor: “You 
tempted me by sober indulgence,” and 
put him in jail for your abuse of a 
thing harmless in itself. 

Man-Made Moral Laws 

Every government that has at¬ 
tempted to legislate for the uplifting of 
the moral sense of its people or to sup¬ 
press the vices of its people, has in¬ 
evitably come to grief. Man-made 
moral law accused Socrates and poi¬ 
soned him to death, because he reasoned 
from nature to nature’s God, and his 
teachings were followed by the splendid 
ethical philosophy of Plato. It was 
man-made moral law that accused Christ 
and crucified Him, and from this trag¬ 
edy of man’s conceit and intolerance 
came the inspired Gospels and Epistles 
of His followers that teach the true 
morality. It was man-made moral 
law that made a code and ritual for 
Bunyan and put him in jail for recal¬ 
citrancy, and from the jail came the 
great “Pilgrim’s Progress.” So it may 
be that from prohibition,—a bastard 
child of hypocrisy, selfishness and in¬ 
tolerance—an apostacy from God’s 


The Eighteenth Amendment 


41 


law to man’s law,—there may come a 
great good, an awakening to the jeop¬ 
ardy of freedom of conscience and 
personal, moral responsibility,—man’s 
free will and God’s sovereignty. 

Thus man’s concepts of “high 
moral ideas” may be ghastly blunders. 
Doubtless these persecutors were sin¬ 
cere and acted according to their “best 
light”; but “they knew not what they 
did” and unenlightened sincerity does 
not palliate wrong. We are too apt to 
think that we alone are wise and pun¬ 
ish moral remissness by rule, forgetting 
that God alone is omniscient and 
punishes or pardons each person accord¬ 
ing to his own deserts, and that He has 
made man a free agent to choose be¬ 
tween right and wrong. 

The Christian religion is the highest 
type of moral sentiment. “Man’s 
chief aim is to glorify God and enjoy 
Him forever,” but attempts to coerce 
religious beliefs have continually im¬ 
mersed the world in cruel bloodshed. 
The framers of our Constitution, 
cognizant of this fact, have placed in 
the fundamental law a prohibition 
respecting “the establishment of re¬ 
ligion or prohibiting the free exercise 
thereof.” If it is baneful to attempt to 
establish the highest creed of human 
dignity and endeavor by law, it is 
much more so to deal with the lesser 
beliefs and practices of human nature, 
wherein one person does not trespass 
upon the legal rights of another. 

Fancied Evils 

I come now to deal with the Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment and the Volstead 
Act. 

These change the spirit of our Gov¬ 
ernment and its structure. They are 
immoral and irreligious. They are 
distressing economic disturbances. 
They are defended solely on the 
ground of morality. Fanciful horrors 
are imagined that appeal to the in¬ 


stinct of sympathy and commiseration. 
They furnish “a tongue with a fringe of 
brains.” Our nation is pictured as one 
of incorrigible drunkards; liquor and 
the saloon in politics are portrayed as 
a dominating, baneful influence. The 
fancied horrors are occasional, not 
general, and come with as much fre¬ 
quency without, as with the indulgence 
in excessive drink. 

I resent the slander that this is a 
nation of drunkards. The develop¬ 
ment of this country from small be¬ 
ginnings to grandeur attests the viril¬ 
ity—physically, mentally and morally 
—of its citizenship. If the saloon 
were a menace to our political welfare, 
we have not improved either in mental¬ 
ity or morality in accepting the Anti- 
Saloon League in its stead. In the 
name of goodness and morality, they 
invade the sacredness of the churches 
and Sunday schools and levy tribute 
upon the pennies of the confiding 
children for selfish expenditures in liv¬ 
ing and for buying political power, 
while they teach the heresy that man’s 
power, usurped to regenerate the 
human soul by force and imprisonment, 
is greater than God’s power and love. 
We are out of the pan into the fire. 

“But,” say the rich philanthropists, 
“the laborer is our ward and he will 
spend less of his small earnings in his 
humble club for beer and more on an 
easy couch on which to rest his weary 
bones.” When were they consecrated 
as the patron saints of the humble 
workingman? Are not they who earn 
their own livelihoods as free-born as the 
pseudo-philanthropists, and have they 
not the right to the same free choice of 
personal conduct as they? Does 
wealth justify such arrogant mastery? 
At the bottom of their pretended phi¬ 
lanthropy lies the same selfish and sor¬ 
did motive that enabled them to amass, 
by “quick turns,” their immense for¬ 
tunes. Tear off the mask of pretense 


42 


The Annals of the American Academy 


and disclose the naked selfishness of 
purpose. These “guardians of the 
workingman” can ill afford to preach 
temperance as a moral quality to 
others, while their cellars are full of the 
choicest vintages. Every man who 
advocates total abstinence for others 
should observe the strict letter and 
spirit of the law. It is this hypocrisy 
and lack of moral courage which make 
the cause of compulsory temperance so 
despicable. 

Where Will This Tyranny End? 

The Eighteenth Amendment pro¬ 
hibits the manufacture, sale or trans¬ 
portation of intoxicating liquors within, 
or the import into, or export from the 
United States for beverage purposes. 
The second section gives Congress and 
the several states concurrent power to 
enforce this article by appropriate leg¬ 
islation. The subjects of emphasis in 
this Amendment are “intoxicating 
liquors” for “beverage purposes” 
and concurrent poicer to enforce the 
article. 

That this is purely a sumptuary 
measure is clearly denoted by the fact 
that the power to legislate is directed 
against the use of liquors designed “for 
beverage purposes.” Sumptuary leg¬ 
islation is directed in restraint of ex¬ 
cesses in apparel, food or luxuries; and, 
according to Adam Smith, is of the 
“highest impertinence and presump¬ 
tion.” If it be once conceded that, 
under our form of government, laws of 
this character may be forced by a 
small majority upon a large minority, 
there is no end to its infinite folly. A 
single example is powerful enough to 
break down the fortification of in¬ 
dividual freedom, so carefully laid by 
our Fathers, and let in an avalanche of 
miserable regulations, forbidding every 
human diversion and aspiration. We 
may be denied useless adornments of 
equipage, extravagant homes with 


their art-decorations, and even large 
fortunes. 

When such a power is once conceded, 
it augments itself and those who are the 
victors of today may be the vanquished 
of tomorrow. When Pandora’s box is 
open, we know not what evils may fly 
from its bursting womb. Absolute 
popular pow r er is as tyrannical, as 
relentless and as unreasonable as 
monarchial autocracy. The constant 
struggle of the human race has been 
against this sort of oppression, what¬ 
ever may have been the form of gov¬ 
ernmental authority. 

Federal Government Outside Its 
Limits 

But the apologists of this Amend¬ 
ment say it is a police regulation. It 
wears none of the lineaments of a police 
law r , and its candid profession makes it 
a simple and pure sumptuary enact¬ 
ment. To concede it to be a police 
regulation adds nothing in its extenua¬ 
tion. Whether it be one or the other, 
it is an usurpation of pow r er by the 
federal Government and is as clearly a 
conquest of the rights of states (as w r e 
shall endeavor to show) as that of any 
capture of territory vi et armis. It w^as 
never intended that the federal Govern¬ 
ment should have the authority to leg¬ 
islate upon the conduct of the citizens 
of the several states. That pow T er was 
expressly reserved to them. It is said 
the Supreme Court has upheld its 
validity. So it has,—by a majority. 
The first impressions of the Court have 
quite often been changed upon more 
mature reflection and by the strong logic 
of events. 

Congress and the states have “con¬ 
current pow r er to enforce” the provi¬ 
sions of the Amendment. This means 
something or nothing. The Supreme 
Court has said it means nothing and has 
eliminated it by construction. Con¬ 
gress had no pow r er to enact legislation 


The Eighteenth Amendment 


43 


upon this subject before the Amend¬ 
ment ;—the states had. It gave nothing, 
therefore, to the states, but did abstract 
from the states the absolute power they 
held before, and subordinated that 
absolute power to the absolute pow r er 
of the federal Government. Accord¬ 
ing to all previous decisions of the 
Supreme Court, where power is given 
by the Constitution to Congress, it is 
supreme and unchallenged in the exer¬ 
cise of that power, and all state legis¬ 
lation in that field is absolutely void. 1 
So that if you strike out the w T ord “con¬ 
current” from the Amendment, as the 
Supreme Court has done, the consent of 
the federal Government, to any enact¬ 
ment by the states upon the subject of 
prohibition, is absolutely forbidden and 
is a nullity. 

It is silly to say the states are at¬ 
tempting to nullify the Eighteenth 
Amendment when they fail to pass or 
repeal laws to aid in its enforcement. 
The federal Government, being the 
supreme source of all controlling power 
upon this subject, the states are denied 
any original authority over it. It 
would be as well to say that the states 
nullify the postal or revenue or bank¬ 
ruptcy laws passed by Congress, when 
they fail to pass assisting or support¬ 
ing acts, and fail to supply in their 
enforcement their full complement of 
police officers. No doubt the astute 
framers of this Amendment drew it 
thus, that it might be urged upon the 
states as an argument for accepting 
the Amendment, in order that they 
would lose none of their control over 
the subject. 

Democratic Despotism 

The Amendment Is a Usurpation of 
Power .—Prior to the adoption of the 
Eighteenth Amendment, the United 
States was a pure federation of inde¬ 
pendent sovereign states. It regulated 
1 111. v. Wabash R. R. 


their mutual relations and their foreign 
affairs as members of a federation. It 
was intended to do those things for the 
states that they, acting separately, 
could not do for themselves. It ex¬ 
ercised no direct authority over the 
subjects of the different states, except 
as to those things that directly affected 
the federal relations. It was not 
meant that it should. Its field of 
activity, in conception and early 
practice, was different. It was created 
after the states, and by them, to per¬ 
form certain functions which the 
states were inadequate to accomplish. 
The states were complete sovereigns in 
all domestic affairs. This is the marked 
difference between our federal Govern¬ 
ment and the federation of German 
states. The latter had the power, and 
they did act through legislation di¬ 
rectly upon the people of the states in 
their domestic affairs. This, in fact, 
was a centralized, while ours was a 
distributed, power,—the power of the 
community. 

History teaches that no government 
far removed from the people can long 
endure, or endure long free from an 
odious despotism. All tyrannies are 
alike in effect. The despotism of abso¬ 
lute democracy is just as offensive as 
that of absolute monarchy. 

The revolts of the past were not 
against the form, but against the con¬ 
duct of government. They sprang 
from the anguish of people deprived of 
freedom, oppressed by burdens of tax¬ 
ation and enslaved. Stealthily and 
insidiously, their rights were invaded 
by the ruling classes until the burden of 
living was greater than the terror of 
death. The government became so 
destructive of their right of life, liberty 
and the pursuit of happiness that the 
people, in the words of the Declaration 
of Independence, exercised “the right 
to alter or to abolish it and to insti¬ 
tute a new government.” The most 


44 


The Annals of the American Academy 


usual and intimate relations of life are 
in the community, where customs, 
habits of thought and ideals make the 
rules of conduct. Communities differ 
in all those respects quite as much as do 
nations or individuals. 

A Radical Change 

So, by this Amendment, we have 
introduced a radical change in the 
organic structure of our federal Gov¬ 
ernment. We have commissioned it to 
legislate upon the purely local and 
domestic affairs of every community in 
every state of the Union, and have ex¬ 
pressly denied to them the power all 
communities have been accustomed to 
exercise for more than a century and a 
quarter. We have begun the first 
step towards the centralization of 
political power at Washington, and the 
destruction of the natural right of 
communities to regulate their conduct 
according to their own conceptions of 
propriety. 

The states and the communities 
within the states are comparatively as 
distant from the seat of the federal 
Government as were the colonies from 
London at the time of the Declaration 
of Independence. It was not the 
distance from the seat of ultimate 
governmental authority, nor the dis¬ 
like of association, that provoked the 
Declaration of Independence, but the 
local wrongs inflicted by the British 
Government. It can be said as truly 
now, under the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment and the Volstead Act of the fed¬ 
eral Government, as it was of King 
George: “He has erected a multitude 
of new offices and sent hither swarms of 
officers to harass our people and eat out 
their substance” and has forbidden us 
to enact “laws the most wholesome and 
necessary for public good.” 

The conduct of man is governed by 
certain factors, inherent or external, 
non-political and political. We have 


not the time or space to analyze these 
different factors. We may safely as¬ 
sert, however, that the most potent are 
those which play their part in the ac¬ 
tive life of the community and are non¬ 
political in character. Aside from 
those inherent in man, those relating to 
his intercourse with his fellow man in 
close community contact, are the most 
potent in promoting progress in hap¬ 
piness, prosperity and material welfares. 
Among these are custom, ethics, the 
parental and marital associations, pub¬ 
lic opinion or community of thought. 

It necessarily follows that commu¬ 
nity-government is always the best gov¬ 
ernment for community-people,—one 
which more nearly meets their needs 
and desires than a government far- 
removed from them,—the distant gov¬ 
ernment being unacquainted with 
their notions and needs of life, unsym¬ 
pathetic with them, and hence arbitrary. 
So, our Fathers, with an appreciative 
understanding' of the controlling mo¬ 
tives of human conduct and learned in 
the experiences of the world, provided 
for and insisted upon local govern¬ 
ment in all the relations involving 
human conduct. 

The Constitution of 1789 

The Constitution of 1789 expressly 
defined the sovereignty that the states 
and the citizens of the states ceded to 
the federal Government and contained 
a clearly implied reservation of all not 
expressly ceded, which was by later 
amendment (Art. 4) made explicit. I 
used the word “ceded” by the states 
and citizens of the states. Article 1, 
Section 1, uses the word “granted.” 
It says: “All legislative powers herein 
granted .” 

So it must be, in the light of language 
and of history, that the federal Govern¬ 
ment was founded by cessions, grants 
or conveyances to it by the states and 
the citizens of the states. If a simple 


The Eighteenth Amendment 


45 


contract between sovereign states, the 
right of secession, upon the breach of 
any covenant by one, could not be 
denied; but if a grant or conveyance, 
the things granted or conveyed could 
not be reclaimed by the grantor. It 
was the latter, and hence the Union be¬ 
came indestructible. 

It being then a grant, it must be 
strictly construed and the grant itself 
contain nothing that was not expressly 
granted. So it was affirmed expressly 
by Article X of the Amendments, 
which was submitted by the first Con¬ 
gress: “The powers not delegated to 
the United States by the Constitution, 
nor prohibited by it (the Constitution) 
to the states, are reserved to the states 
respectively, or to the people.” These 
first ten amendments were regarded as 
a Bill of Rights, for which Mr. Hamil¬ 
ton contended there was no necessity, 
because they were clearly implied from 
the text of the Constitution, but they 
were insisted upon in the vote of ratifi¬ 
cation by many of the states. 

Regarding, then, the federal powers 
as being a conveyance, pro tanto, by the 
states and the citizens of the states and 
limited only to such as were conveyed, 
we then inquire, by what just authority 
could the federal Government in in- 
vitum compel any state to grant or con¬ 
vey to it any further part of its sover¬ 
eignty, for the purpose of nullifying the 
system? If it assumed to exercise the 
sovereignty of any state that it does not. 
voluntarily grant, is it not a usurper? 
If it undertakes to regulate the domes¬ 
tic affairs of any state that such state 
has not conceded to it, does it not do so 
by vis major ,—by conquest? 

Provision of Constitution 

But it is said the Constitution pro¬ 
vides it may be amended (Art.V). It 
is true the Constitution provides it may 
be amended and the manner of making 
the amendments (Art. V). But does 


this mean that the creature of the 
states and the citizens of the states may 
so amend its powers as to compel its 
creators to give it that which they did 
not cede to it; or that by self-exertion 
it could create powers not inherently 
possessed, and seize from the states and 
the people the added power; or that 
because power is given, the creature 
may seize all the power the creators 
possess? By the same argument, if a 
benevolently-disposed person gives a 
part of his substance for public pur¬ 
poses, the beneficiary may seize the 
whole. Such an argument would seem 
to be absurd. 

The true construction of the right of 
amendment in Article V, is that the 
amendments must relate to the powers 
and methods of exercising them within 
the grants of the Constitution or in¬ 
strument of conveyance. We cannot 
refrain from here quoting the argument 
made by the learned lawyer and phil¬ 
osopher, Mr. George Ticknor Curtis, 
in his valuable treatise on the Constitu¬ 
tion. He said (p. 160): 

The Ninth and Tenth Amendments are 
in themselves express fundamental pro¬ 
visions, fixing immutably the reserved 
rights of the states. If three fourths of 
the states were to undertake to repeal them, 
or to remove them from their place in the 
foundations of the Union, it would be 
equivalent to a revolution. There would 
remain nothing but the dominant force of 
three fourths of the states, and this would 
soon end in a complete consolidation of 
the physical force of the nation, to be 
followed by a different system of govern¬ 
ment of a despotic character. 

It seems to me, therefore, that, while it 
is within the amending power to change the 
framework of the government in some 
respects, it is not within that power to 
deprive any state, without its own consent, 
of any rights of self-government which it 
did not cede to the United States by the 
Constitution, or which the Constitution 
did not prohibit it from exercising. In 
other words, I think the power of amending 


46 


The Annals of the American Academy 


the Constitution was intended to apply to 
amendments which would modify the 
mode of carrying into effect the original 
provisions and powers of the Constitution, 
but not to enable three fourths of the 
states to grasp new power at the expense of 
any unwilling state. 

Again he says (p. 163): 

But when the Constitution, as originally 
framed and promulgated, came before the 
people of the several states for adoption 
and ratification, they were not content to 
leave this very important matter (original 
sovereignty of the states) to implication; 
they demanded an express reservation of 
all the powers, which were not to be ceded 
by the people of the several states to the 
federal Government, or which they were 
not to be prohibited from exercising. Ac¬ 
cordingly, the Tenth Amendment, adopted 
in 1789-91, was made to declare: 

“The powers not delegated to the 
United States by the Constitution, nor 
prohibited by it to the states are reserved 
to the states respectively, or to the people. ” 

By this reservation every state remains 
a self-governing political community in 
respect to its own inhabitants, in every 
relation in which these inhabitants are not, 
by the Constitution of the United States, 
placed under the authority of the federal 
Government. 

It is this mass of rights, privileges, and 
powers, not vested in the federal Govern¬ 
ment, but retained by the people of each 
state, that constitutes the state’s sover¬ 
eignty. It follows, as a necessary conse¬ 
quence from this system, that the people 
of every state in this Union have under 
their entire control every relation of their 
inhabitants that is not under the control of 
the United States by reason of some pro¬ 
vision in the federal Constitution. With 
the domestic relations of their inhabitants, 
the states can deal as they see fit. 

Discrimination Shown 

The Volstead Act, passed pursuant 
to the Eighteenth Amendment, gives 
the Amendment absurd and discrim¬ 
inating effect. It assumes that any 
beverage containing more than one- 


half of one per cent of alcohol is intox¬ 
icating. This is well known to be a 
false assumption. It practically con¬ 
fiscates all liquor except that of those 
who were rich enough to accumulate in 
their private cellars sufficient for their 
own use and the entertainment of their 
friends. If it is right to confiscate any 
liquors, it is just to confiscate all liq¬ 
uors. To enforce total abstinence 
without discrimination or partiality, 
private as well as merchantable stock 
should fall under the condemnation of 
this moral law. But, for political 
reasons, wealthy persons who were 
contributing to the “slush-fund” of 
the Anti-Saloon League were practi¬ 
cally exempted from the inhibition of 
the law. It was intended evidently 
only for the poor. 

Every advocate of compulsory vir¬ 
tue who, since the law went into effect, 
has drunk intoxicating liquors, is a 
moral culprit. Moral delinquency is 
in spirit and not in the letter. 

The law is also an alliance with the 
bootlegger, for he is its direct and 
necessary product; and every one who 
purchases from the bootlegger is his 
accessory, as culpable as the bootlegger, 
although no penalty is imposed upon 
him. 

This law not only discriminates 
between the rich and the poor, between 
the seller and the purchaser of prohib¬ 
ited liquor, but also it discriminates 

• against the agricultural interests, the 
main source of the Government’s in¬ 
come, as has been demonstrated by 
Senator Broussard, in his address to the 

• Senate on February 27, 1923. 

The enforcement of the Volstead 
Act is under the patronage of the 
Anti-Saloon League. The enforcement 
agents are not men of the character or 
type who would be commissioned to 
elevate the moral standard of any 
people. They are sent out into differ¬ 
ent communities with the Act and 


The Eighteenth Amendment 


47 


revolvers. They must be “rough¬ 
necks” to enforce the observance of the 
law. They know but the one object 
and care for no other. 

The Church 

The crowning disgrace of this law is 
that in the moral sphere, it sets aside 
the authority of the churches and sub¬ 
stitutes compulsion in its stead. It 
reestablishes the inquisitiop of Charles 
and Alva. It seems to have an irre¬ 
sistible fascination for some preachers. 
Many of them have forsaken the pulpit 
for political places in the Anti-Saloon 
League. They seem to have been 


unable to persuade to repentance in the 
pulpit and to be convinced that the 
only means to redeem humanity is the 
bludgeon. Some one, in commenting 
upon the reign of Constantine, said 
that the bishops then were politicians 
first and then priests. It may be said 
of many of them now. What the 
church now needs most to re-vitalize 
its holy mission is ministry of able, 
learned and consecrated men,—men, 
who will remember always that they 
are not supermen, and that as “minis¬ 
ters of religion” they are called to 
serve, not to master and subdue man¬ 
kind. 


What’s Wrong With the Eighteenth Amendment? 

By Fabian Franklin 

Contributing Editor The Independent 


O N or about Christmas day, 1922, 
the District Attorney of the 
United States at New York City felt 
moved to issue a statement in which he 
implored the people not to “barter 
their Constitution for a cocktail.” So 
far as I have been able to observe, this 
pathetic appeal found no echo what¬ 
ever in the bosoms of his stony-hearted 
fellow citizens. If they drank fewer 
cocktails than they had expected to, it 
was not because of any compunctions 
of conscience aroused by the District 
Attorney’s words, but solely because 
the officers of the law, by strenuous 
exertions, made the getting of the cock¬ 
tails more difficult or the dispensing of 
them more dangerous. 

But District Attorney Hayward’s 
phrase is worth pondering, all the same. 
For, in a very true sense, though not at 
all the sense which he intended, the 
Constitution has been bartered for a 
cocktail. The barter was effected when 
the Eighteenth Amendment was put 
into the Constitution; what has hap¬ 
pened since is a mere following out of 
what was done then. For then it was 
that the integrity of the Constitution, 
its place in the hearts and minds of the 
people, its hold upon their loyal at¬ 
tachment, was lowered to the plane of 
dealing with cocktails. 

Out of Place in the Nation’s 
Organic Law 

The first thing, then, that is wrong 
with the Eighteenth Amendment is 
that it incorporates into the Constitu¬ 
tion subject-matter that is utterly out 
of place in the organic law of a great 
nation such as ours. The object of 
such an instrument—not merely of the 


Constitution actually framed by the 
Fathers of our Republic, but of any 
Constitution designed to serve such a 
purpose as that Constitution has 
served—is to place beyond the reach 
of the ordinary processes of legislation 
certain fundamental features of the 
Government, and certain fundamental 
rights of the people. Our own Con¬ 
stitution undertook to do this, and 
nothing more. It provided a certain 
framework for the federal Government 
which it created; it fixed the limits of 
the power of that Government, as 
distinguished from the state govern¬ 
ments; and it guaranteed certain 
essentials of liberty and property. It 
said nothing whatever about cocktails; 
and it commanded the kind of respect 
which a true Constitution is capable of 
commanding and which no Constitu¬ 
tion that undertakes to deal with cock¬ 
tails can possibly command. 

Abandonment of Our Federal 
System 

This, however, though the most 
cardinal vice, is by no means the only 
fundamental wrong of the Eighteenth 
Amendment. In addition to being a 
gross and flagrant departure from the 
purposes to which the Constitution of 
any great nation should be devoted, the 
Eighteenth Amendment constitutes an 
outright abandonment of the distinc¬ 
tive spirit of our American Common¬ 
wealth. I do not refer to any juristic 
doctrine of state rights, any abstract 
doctrine of state sovereignty. Quite 
apart from all differences of opinion as 
to those doctrines—in the North as 
well as the South, in the East as well as 
the West—local self-government has 


48 


The Eighteenth Amendment 


49 


been the very heart of American institu¬ 
tions. The great triumph of our Re¬ 
public has lain in the combination of a 
genuine feeling of national unity, with 
an equally genuine feeling of the in¬ 
dependent power and the independent 
responsiblility of each state, in all those 
matters that are concerned with the 
daily lives and the ordinary interests 
of its citizens. To this combination of 
centralized power, in those matters in 
which centralized power is essential and 
local self-government in all other mat¬ 
ters, competent thinkers have always 
ascribed the success that has attended 
the great experiment of the American 
Republic. Not only the preservation 
of harmony and good will throughout 
the vast expanse of our diversified 
country, but also the development of 
progress along innumerable lines, has 
been bound up with this wholesome 
absence of a deadening centralization. 

At all this the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment is a deadly blow. Any future 
extension of centralized power that it 
is reasonable to imagine possible can 
but be a pale reflection of the thing that 
the Eighteenth Amendment has done— 
or at least has undertaken to do. If 
the central Government can dictate to 
the people of New York or Illinois or 
Massachussetts w'hat they shall be 
permitted to eat or drink; if the people 
of New York and Illinois and Mas¬ 
sachusetts submit to that dictation, and 
grow accustomed, year after year, to 
seeing it enforced upon them by federal 
power, then it is difficult to imagine any 
extreme of governmental centralization 
which they would resent as a curtail¬ 
ment of their prerogatives or an in¬ 
vasion of their rights. They might 
fight against the invasion in a given 
instance, on account of their objection 
to the specific thing involved in it; but 
never again can such invasion be re¬ 
sisted as an innovation. The Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment, if adhered to and 
5 


enforced, is in essence a complete 
repudiation of the spirit of our federal 
system of self-governing states. 

Offence Against the First 
Principles of Lawmaking 

But we have not yet got to the end 
of the wrongness of the Eighteenth 
Amendment, nor anywhere near it. 
Besides violating the spirit and degrad¬ 
ing the character of the Constitution, 
and besides taking the very life out of 
our federal system of local self-govern¬ 
ment, it is a flagrant offence against one 
of the first principles of rational law¬ 
making. No principle of lawmaking 
has been more thoroughly recognized by 
all competent thinkers than the prin¬ 
ciple that a law regulating the ordinary 
habits of the people should never be 
enacted unless it commands the assent 
not merely of a majority, but of an 
overwhelming majority, of the com¬ 
munity to which it applies. 

Everybody knows—everybody knew 
when the Eighteenth Amendment was 
adopted—that in every one of our great 
cities, so far from there being an over¬ 
whelming majority in favor of prohibi¬ 
tion, there was a decisive majority 
against it. Everybody knew that the 
like was true in many of the smaller 
cities. Everybody knew that there 
were many whole states, great and 
small, in which prohibition could not 
command a majority vote of the people, 
and that there were a number of others 
in which the vote would be nearly 
evenly divided. And these conclu¬ 
sions, if they needed any confirmation, 
were abundantly confirmed in the 
elections of last November. 

In the face of such a situation, it is 
idle to talk of the question whether or 
not a majority of the whole people of 
the United States favored or did not 
favor the Eighteenth Amendment. 
Whether a majority favored it or not, 
the Amendment, having been adopted 




50 


The Annals of the American Academy 


in conformity with the process pre¬ 
scribed by the Constitution itself, has 
become a valid part of that instrument; 
but on the other hand, whether a major¬ 
ity favored it or not, the Amendment is 
an outrage upon the first principles of 
rational lawmaking. The only ques¬ 
tion is whether it was an outrage per¬ 
petrated by a majority upon a minority 
or an outrage perpetrated by a minor¬ 
ity upon a majority. The idea that 
51,000,000 people have a right to im¬ 
pose any regulations they please upon 
49,000,000 is as preposterous as the 
idea that 49,000,000 people have a 
right to do the like to 51,000,000. 

And if such objection holds against 
an ordinary law imposing prohibition 
upon a nation of a hundred million peo¬ 
ple, something like half of whom are 
opposed to it—a nation composed of 
states and cities having diverse indi¬ 
vidualities, diverse tastes, and diverse 
modes of life—how much more strongly 
does it hold against a law which even a 
decisive majority of the whole nation is 
powerless to repeal! The very purpose 
of the Eighteenth Amendment was to 
make impossible all practical thought 
of ever getting rid of prohibition. 

No matter how ill it might work in 
the great cities, no matter how much it 
might be resented in ten, or twenty, or 
thirty of our states, no matter what a 
majority of Congress after Congress 
might think about its folly or its tyr¬ 
anny, once it was in the Constitution it 
could not be got out of it so long as 
thirteen of the forty-eight states—thir¬ 
teen states, however small, however 
remote, however peculiar in their con¬ 
ditions—persisted in adhering to the 
Eighteenth Amendment. It was upon 
the hopelessness of this prospect that 
the Anti-Saloon people counted as en¬ 
suring the acquiescence of all decent 
and law-abiding people in the thing 
which they had put through. Con¬ 
fronted with the choice between oppos¬ 


ing a law which could not be repealed 
and accepting it as a finality, the Anti- 
Saloon League took it for granted that 
good citizens would sink their own con¬ 
victions and preferences and loyally 
support the law as a matter of patriotic 
duty. 

Resentment Against an 
Unrepealable Law 

But the trick has not worked that 
way. On the contrary, the more it was 
insisted that the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment could never be repealed, the more 
it was felt that the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment was not morally binding on those 
who regarded it as an act of oppression 
and unreason. The one great reason 
why an ordinary law that is oppressive 
and unreasonable commands the re¬ 
spect, or at least the obedience, of good 
citizens who oppose it is that, if it is as 
bad as they think it, there is a fair 
chance of getting it repealed. But 
this does not hold in the case of a law 
that is placed beyond the reach of 
argument, a law that is impervious to 
attack, however offensive its working. 
The light-hearted contempt with which 
the Eighteenth Amendment is treated 
by millions of good citizens—citizens 
who in other things are as law-abiding 
as anybody—is a phenomenon without 
a parallel in the history of free institu¬ 
tions. But there is nothing surprising 
about it, for the incorporation of such a 
thing into the organic law of a great 
federal nation is still more utterly un¬ 
paralleled. In making us a nation of 
lawbreakers, the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment has done only what, by its very 
nature, it was calculated to do. 

What Can Be Done? 

While this is far from being all of 
what is wrong with the Eighteenth 
Amendment, “ ’tis enough, ’twill serve.” 
But the question of what we are going 
to do about it is a far more difficult one 
to answer. The only thoroughly right 


The Eighteenth Amendment 


51 


thing to do about it is to repeal it; and 
the deep and widespread resentment it 
has aroused gives me some hope that 
this will not prove so utterly impossi¬ 
ble as it once seemed. But in the 
meanwhile—and that will be at best a 
long, long time—the evil situation 
which it has created has to be met; and 
every way of dealing with that situa¬ 
tion is open to objection. 

Essentially there are, so long as the 
Eighteenth Amendment remains un¬ 
repealed, only two possible policies 
worth considering. The first is to let 
the Volstead Act stand, and continue 
for an indefinite period the hideous 
regime of bootlegging, corruption of 
officers of the law, illicit home-brewing 
in millions of homes, and contemptu¬ 
ous defiance of the law by thousands of 
persons of the highest standing in the 
community. 

The second is to repeal the Volstead 
Act, and substitute for it either a wine- 
and-beer law—I mean real beer and 
wine, no 2.75 per cent simulacrum—or a 
law leaving it to the several states to 
make their own statutes for the en¬ 
forcement, or professed enforcement, of 
the Eighteenth Amendment. 


I think the second policy—that of 
either mitigating the national law or 
leaving the matter to the states—far 
the better of the two. But it is a 
choice of evils; for in either case the 
Eighteenth Amendment is flouted; in 
the first case by millions of decent 
citizens, in the second case by Congress 
or the state legislatures. 

For the predicament in which the 
nation finds itself, it is idle to blame the 
people who do not supinely bow down 
to a legislative atrocity. The people 
are the same for whom our Constitution 
and our laws have been made during 
four generations of American history; 
the change does not lie in them, but in 
the preposterous enactment to which 
they have been fatuously asked to sub¬ 
mit without a murmur. 

If the experience shall have impressed 
upon the nation a realization of the 
folly of forgetting that there are limits 
to what laws can successfully under¬ 
take, and that there are bounds beyond 
which the right of majorities to dictate 
to minorities does not extend, the bit¬ 
ter lesson we are learning may prove to 
be worth even the frightful price we are 
paying for it. 


Inherent Frailties of Prohibition 


By John Ivoren 


Former President American Statistical Association; Author of “Alcohol and Society,’ 

Economic Aspects of the Liquor Problem,” etc. 


‘The 


‘' IVE us the strong arm of the 

vJT law!” More than eighty years 
ago this cry arose in Maine at a time 
when the intense enthusiasm for per¬ 
sonal abstinence, which marked the 
early “primitive” temperance move¬ 
ment, had begun to wane. The fever 
heat of moral suasion had spent itself. 
It w r as given to but a few to sustain a 
permanent hatred of drink as such. 
Among the mass, the old habits of life 
and mode of thought reasserted them¬ 
selves. The foreshadowed millennium 
faded from view. How could it be 
brought near? Since not by persua¬ 
sion, then by force. It was a tried 
expedient in many domains of life, but 
novel as a means of promoting tem¬ 
perance; and so a new commandment 
was invented. If people, argued the 
fathers of prohibition, will not be per¬ 
suaded by the dictates of their own 
conscience, we must whip them into 
obedience with the strong arm of the 
law. The burning speech which had 
transported entire populations into an 
exceeding zeal for total abstinence was 
gradually hushed by the shrill voices 
of the apostles of suasion by force, if 
one may indulge in the paradox. 

Effects of Use of Force 

From that time on, ever since the 
adoption of the first prohibition law in 
Maine, the advocates of this form of 
instilling temperance have been busy 
tinkering with liquor laws, piling 
statute upon statute, sharpening penal¬ 
ties, and seeking the election of officials 
presumed to be favorable to strict en¬ 
forcement. The story of Maine has 
had its replicas throughout the entire 
Union: in state after state, the preach¬ 


ment of temperance as a personal 
virtue has been supplanted by the 
application of the police force as the 
sure means of compelling it. And, in 
the fullness of time, when the futility of 
relying on force had been fully demon¬ 
strated in the local community or the 
individual state, the professional tem¬ 
perance hosts united logically and in¬ 
evitably in a plea for the invocation 
of federal force. So the Eighteenth 
Amendment was called into being, and 
its possibilities for the employment of 
force were developed to the full in the 
Volstead Act. 

Thus far the most tangible result of 
this latest regime of force, as a means of 
improving public and private morals, 
has been to create a moral chaos, a 
morass, from which it is not apparent 
that w T e shall emerge without indelible 
stain and contamination. The reason 
for this is most simple, but, like many 
elementary facts, very slow in gaining 
credence: prohibition rests on the fun¬ 
damentally unsound concept that all 
things finally bend to brute force. The 
long story of mankind gives the un¬ 
qualified lie to this view. The never- 
ending procession of governments and 
dynasties, which have failed or gone 
under, are foremost witnesses to the 
fallacy, that all things are possible by 
force, even in the domain of political 
government. They failed or disap¬ 
peared because they recognized no other 
means of securing conformity than 
that symbolized by the sword and the 
prison. When, at the time of the French 
Revolution, it seemed as if the shackles 
of brute force which held all peoples 
would be shattered forever, the very, 
protagonists of liberty, equality and 


52 


Inherent Frailties of Prohibition 


53 


brotherhood fell into the same old error: 
I Is croient tout possible a la force , tout 
facile par la force. Even the Terror¬ 
ists sought a noble end, though by the 
wrong means, and were themselves 
undone by it. The latest great strug¬ 
gle for supremacy by sheer force is 
fresh in our minds. Its aftermath has 
been a world in desolation, revolt, 
common ruin, and infinite sorrow. 

Since the application of force in the 
domain of political government, as now 
constituted, bears such bitter fruit, why 
should we expect a finer fruition when 
the question is one of regulating the 
conduct of the individual, in order to 
prevent an indulgence which is not nec¬ 
essarily injurious socially and may not 
be deleterious to him personally? In 
other words, seeing the failure of effort 
to dissuade the multitude from the use 
of intoxicants and to conform to an 
arbitrary standard of personal conduct 
and mode of thought to support it, 
what hope lies in seeking to compel 
obedience by force? The answer is 
echoed on the pages of every news¬ 
paper: publicly , organized lawlessness 
throughout the land, carrying in its 
hideous train an endless succession of 
crimes and corruption, the impotence of 
the authorities to dam the flood of out¬ 
lawry; privately , extreme restlessness, 
dissatisfaction and a growing contempt 
for law which more or less unconsciously 
and gradually comes to embrace more 
than prohibition and helps to under¬ 
mine the foundation of citizenship. 

Seriousness of Situation 

Lest I be chided for making an over¬ 
statement, let me quote the following 
extract from a speech by John W. H. 
Crim, Assistant United States Attor¬ 
ney General, recently made before the 
Alumni Association of William and 
Mary College: 

On the Canadian border, on the Mexican 
border, on the Atlantic Ocean, on the Gulf 


of Mexico, on the Pacific Ocean, a belt 
around the entire United States, we have a 
veritable “No Man’s Land,” where boot¬ 
legging, graft, piracy, smuggling and murder 
are committed in a degree of deliberately 
and skilfully organized infamy which is 
without parallel in American history. 

This terrible presentment might 
easily have been amplified by reference 
to the less spectacular, but equally 
nefarious results, flowing from the 
illicit manufacture of intoxicants all 
over the United States. The extrem¬ 
ities to which organized authority has 
been reduced in its battle for enforce¬ 
ment have received a final emphasis by 
the serious consideration of employing 
the forces of the Navy and Army 
against rum running. Already armed 
conflicts have grown too common to 
excite public consternation. 

The tragedy of the situation is deep¬ 
ened by the public’s callous indifference 
to a reign of lawlessness which makes 
our country a byword, an object of 
universal sneer and contempt. It 
does not mend matters that secret 
bands such as the Ku Klux Klan, the 
modern Terrorists, undertake to vindi¬ 
cate prohibition by inflicting punish¬ 
ment for its infractions, for they merely 
travesty the majesty of the law by 
wrongfully usurping its powers, albeit 
in the name of morality. Comedy 
sometimes marches with tragedy in 
this singular prohibition pageant, as, 
for instance, when the Anti-Saloon 
League of Iowa solemnly votes to 
succour its sister organization in New 
York in doing police duty. Tragi¬ 
comical, too, are certain aspects of the 
international complications over the 
effort to confiscate the liquor of foreign 
ships, even when intended for crew ra¬ 
tions, since the sailors need but to step 
ashore to quench their alcoholic thirst 
at a gradually diminishing cost. The 
while other nations afford us a curious 
new definition of passive resistance. 


54 


The Annals of the American Academy 


State Defiance of the Act 

If the resentment against prohibition 
were merely reflected in the crude vio¬ 
lations for the sake of profit at any 
cost, one could regard it with less con¬ 
cern, although we must remember that 
bootlegging would soon become a losing 
game were it not abetted and supported 
by hundreds of thousands of buyers of 
intoxicants, blessed with more or less 
ample pocketbooks who, no doubt, 
would take it ill should their patriotic 
uprightness be questioned. Of far 
greater moment is the protest against 
prohibition registered by legislatures 
of different states. New York has 
repealed the Mullan-Gage law; the 
Pennsylvania legislature has calmly 
refused to vote appropriations for en¬ 
forcement of the Volstead Act; in one 
house of the Wisconsin legislature, the 
repeal of the state enforcement law was 
passed; in Massachusetts, the voters 
have once, by an overwhelming vote, 
refused to sanction an enforcement act, 
etc., etc. One can readily grant that 
opposition to the use of the police force 
of the state, in order to vindicate a fed¬ 
eral law, may be motivated by some¬ 
thing higher than a personal feeling 
against prohibition, for one can view 
it critically from a purely legalistic 
standpoint. Yet the states just men¬ 
tioned would probably never have 
taken the stand indicated unless they 
wished to disapprove of prohibition as 
a national policy. 

The constitutional questions in¬ 
volved and the changes that some 
would like to bring about in the relation 
of the federal Government to the states 
with respect to their exercise of the 
police power are, however, far too 
subtle to interest many non-legal 
minds. It is beyond the scope of this 
article to discuss them at length. But 
in passing I will permit myself the fol¬ 
lowing quotations from a recent letter 


to the President by the Constitutional 
Liberty League of Massachusetts: 

The Constitution of the United States is 
the “supreme law of the land 5 ' in certain 
lines only. There is not now and never has 
been any obligation, legal or moral, on 
the states to legislate in accordance with 
the terms of the Constitution or in pur¬ 
suance thereof. They cannot legislate 
successfully in contravention of the Consti¬ 
tution, that is all. 

The courts of the states cannot hear and 
determine cases brought for infractions 
of acts of Congress, or for breach of the 
principles of the Constitution, and the 
United States Courts cannot hear and 
determine cases brought under state laws. 
This has always been true and is as true 
now as it ever was. 

The Eighteenth Amendment has not 
changed the matter. Had it been possible, 
the framers of that Amendment would not 
have given the states any choice, they 
would have drawn an amendment forcing 
them to pass concurrent laws, and to take 
active part in carrying out all the pro¬ 
visions of the Amendment. They well 
knew this to be impossible. 

The states are still separate, sovereign 
entities, to a large extent autonomous, 
though parts of “one indestructible union. ” 

It has been alleged that the police officers 
of a state should arrest all violators of the 
Volstead law and bring them to justice in 
the United States Courts. We know of no 
authority for any such claim. 

Failure to enact a concurrent law, and 
opposition to the proposed passage of a 
concurrent law are harshly characterized as 
“nullifications,” by certain persons who 
do not understand the term. That word 
has no bearing on the situation. 

We do not hear much criticism of the 
various states charging them with “nulli¬ 
fication,” because they have not enacted 
statutes in support of the Fifteenth Amend¬ 
ment to the Constitution, or of the Con¬ 
gress for not passing the “appropriate 
legislation” to that end which the Amend¬ 
ment itself provided for. 

One would hardly suppose that there was 
a more important provision in the whole 
frame of our Government than that which 


55 


Inherent Frailties of Prohibition 


safeguards the principle that race, color or 
previous condition of servitude shall not 
abridge the right of suffrage in national 
or state elections. Why do the opponents 
of “nullification” not remedy this situa¬ 
tion? 

Misdirected Use of Force 

In its essence, therefore, the prevail¬ 
ing revolt against national prohibition, 
not in its grosser aspects, but partic¬ 
ularly through a growing disgust with 
the law shared by millions, very many 
of whom do not hesitate to circumvent 
it when it suits their convenience, is a 
protest against misdirected use of 
force. This state of mind is not at all 
incompatible with a ready assent to 
the need of force for the vindication of 
law in general. Nota bene , there is no 
fundamental complaint against re¬ 
striction; but it is a far cry from regu¬ 
lated liberty to none at all. 

Another w r ay of putting it is to say 
that the unwillingness to obey the 
Volstead Act to the letter is rooted in 
the popular conviction that it makes a 
crime of things that are not wrong in 
themselves, but which simply may 
lead to abuse. Thus one inherent 
frailty of national prohibition is that 
it predicates a transformation of per¬ 
sonal habits and a social mode of life 
upon a fixed application of force, by 
subjecting disobedience to its numer¬ 
ous “thou shalt nots” to dire penal¬ 
ties. 

A Political Issue 

As an inevitable corollary to the 
methods by which the objects of pro¬ 
hibition were to be attained, and in¬ 
cidentally because of the implied use 
of force as its main reliance, the law 
has ever been a political issue. The 
party battles that have raged in many 
states over the acceptance of prohibi¬ 
tion, the enforcement of sumptuary 
legislation and much else are most 
instructive, if now ancient pages in the 


history of political struggles; the 
greater the pity that so little of the 
wdsdom they contain is being heeded. 

With its coming in a national form, 
the question of prohibition has become 
the yellow thread in the tangled skein 
of politics. Both of the major parties 
would no doubt like to break it, but 
its tensile strength is great, and they 
durst not take a stand except as the 
expediency of the hour may dictate. 

Crafty Workings of Politics 

As in many a previous local contest, 
it was deliberately sought to prevent 
the submission of the acceptance of 
the Eighteenth Amendment to popu¬ 
lar vote. The object was plain; it is 
much easier for a determined minority 
to foist its will on a small body of law¬ 
makers than upon the whole population 
of a state. Of course, there are many 
who contend that the people really had 
a chance to express themselves. Let 
me answer by quoting once more from 
the letter of the Constitutional Liberty 
League to the President: 

Notwithstanding all claims to the con¬ 
trary, the people have not passed on this 
question yet. There is much evidence that 
the people are far from satisfied with exist¬ 
ing conditions and that they are becoming 
more and more restive. 

As politics goes, the trick of thwart¬ 
ing a popular vote on prohibition w r as 
successful; but has it brought a moral 
victory? One must forever keep in 
the foreground that the Eighteenth 
Amendment and the Volstead Act 
were to create a new state of public 
morality in which virtue—total absti¬ 
nence—would reign supreme, and 
crime, insanity and most poverty be 
banished for all time. 

If a well-conceived government 
rests on the consent of the governed, 
which is approved American doctrine 
of the 100 per cent variety, why should 
it not be the more necessary to secure 



56 


The Annals of the American Academy 


popular assent to the adoption of a 
governmental policy, which is founded 
upon a disputable concept of right and 
wrong, which postulates for its success 
popular belief in, nay, a hot enthusi¬ 
asm for, abstinence that have never 
been demonstrated, an unwavering 
willingness to forego personal pre¬ 
dilections and liberty, and which sub¬ 
mits to a tyrannical inquisition one’s 
mode of private life? 

Were national prohibition founded 
on immutable ethical principles ac¬ 
cepted by the great majority of the 
people, we ought to show a good bit of 
moral indignation because our kins¬ 
men in Manitoba have just declared 
against prohibition as an undesirable 
policy after due trial, and because the 
voters of Ontario have routed the 
party responsible for prohibition in 
that great province. But the action 
of these neighbors has hardly caused 
the most ordinary newspaper com¬ 
ment. Yet they have rejected what 
we feign to cherish, and we know that 
this move will tend to complicate our 
enforcement difficulties. By the same 
token, we do not popularly accuse 
European nations of moral obliquity 
because they do not think with us on 
prohibition. 

It is childish to seek a parallel be¬ 
tween the warfare against drink and 
that carried on against crime generally 
and against other forms of anti-social 
conduct. All civilized nations are 
governed by the same principles in 
combating crime. It is part of the 
reason why they are called civilized; 
but we stand in solitary isolation in 
outlawing drink as a crime in the wid¬ 
est sense of the word. And this very 
isolation of the national point of view 
which, moreover, has only become in¬ 
carnate in a fanatical minority, makes 
it the more imperative that popular 
assent should be given to and should 
sustain all prohibitive regulations. 


But politics wills it not so. Those 
who engineered the Eighteenth 
Amendment victoriously through its 
different stages, played politics hard 
and fast; they knew and used every 
trick of cajolery and compulsion prac¬ 
ticed by the craft. Nothing is easier 
than to vaunt the existence of an irre¬ 
sistible herd sentiment, however basely 
it is veneered, when the issue is placed 
on moral grounds, and to make poli¬ 
ticians bow to it. Under the whip 
and spur of fear of political annihila¬ 
tion, the most recalcitrant lawmaker 
can be made wonderfully pliant. The 
history of the Volstead Act made 
that clear, and the same play of purely 
political forces in miniature has since 
been reflected in every state fight 
over enforcement legislation. 

Becomes a National Issue 

Now the stage is being set once 
more for a fight over national prohibi¬ 
tion, a football match on the gridiron 
of the Union. The preliminary ma- 
noeuvers have already begun; there 
are loud trumpetings from the camps 
of the opposing teams, but the fight 
is not yet on. Not belonging even 
to the lowly order of the politicanti , 

I shall not venture to say how the 
contestants will line up. It is less 
hazardous to guess how the issue will 
be shaped: There will be highfalutin 
avowals of standing for law and 
order, “squarely behind the Consti¬ 
tution,” etc. Perhaps the political 
bacon can be saved by promising a 
strict enforcement of the law and 
leaving more awkward questions to 
the dictates of expediency for the 
future. 

The moral confusion which exists in 
regard to the whole question of enforce¬ 
ment, I shall consider later on. Here 
be it noted that the party declaring 
most fervently against changes in ex¬ 
isting legislation, or at least against 


Inherent Frailties of Prohibition 


57 


liberalizing the Volstead Act, will 
receive the unqualified endorsement of 
the Anti-Saloon League and—the boot¬ 
leggers! These two have been bed¬ 
fellows before in many a state under 
prohibition. We shall probably repeat 
the recent experience of Sweden where, 
at the last elections, small coast towns, 
themselves properly “dry” officially, 
but most profitably engaged in rum 
running, gave large majorities for na¬ 
tional prohibition. 

Since its inception, an inherent 
weakness of national prohibition has 
been that a “moral issue” has been 
tainted and befuddled by party poli¬ 
tics. Political expediency has tar¬ 
nished the status of enforcement ever 
since the Volstead Act became law. In 
other words, if an overwhelming public 
mandate existed in favor of national 
prohibition a la Volstead, the question 
of enforcement would not be a factor 
in party politics. A noisy “wet” trade 
minority might try to revive it as such, 
but its machinations would certainly 
not instill political fear. 

Temptation of Easy Money 

A third inherent frailty of national 
prohibition is that it is based on a false 
psychology. To begin with, it ignores 
certain evident frailties of human 
nature. Acquisitiveness, vulgarly 
called greed for money, characterizes 
most men. “Easy money” and ways 
of obtaining it are the main spring of 
human thought and activity, much as 
we may dislike to confess it. Now 
bootlegging, rum running, moonshin- 
ing, or by what other unpleasing name 
the traffic should be called, provide an 
astonishingly easy means of making 
money in abundance with comparative 
safety. The man who runs a still or 
peddles liquor, especially in the poor 
quarters, takes a large chance. In 
like manner, the rum runner, whether 
on land or at sea, may assume a des¬ 


perate risk, though, evidently, the 
group behind him may operate without 
great personal exposure; and since his 
occupation grows apace, as witness the 
decline in liquor “quotations,” the 
probability is that for one who gets 
caught, a multitude goes scot free. The 
bootlegger in ordinary, who solicits 
orders, appears to ply his trade un¬ 
molested, for he constantly visits the 
best office buildings in our large cities. 
Bootlegging may simply be an avoca¬ 
tion with him, the rest of his time being 
spent perhaps as an employe of some 
staid office or reputable shop. 

It will hardly be contended that the 
greed instinct can be suppressed by the 
multiplication of enforcement agencies. 
Even if one could quintuple the present 
machinery, it would be impossible to 
visualize a complete enforcement, for 
that would mean safeguarding against 
the potential still in an untold number 
of homes. I believe it was one of the 
chiefs of the enforcement bureau who 
recently said that “the home still is the 
worst enemy of prohibition.” For 
experience has taught him, as it should 
have taught the rest of us, that the 
home still flourishes in proportion to 
the drying up of outside sources of 
supply. Spectacular seizure of rum¬ 
laden ships and the stopping of many a 
point of leakage on our long borders do 
not necessarily presage the actual 
coming of a permanent drouth. 

Alas, it is not only the conscience¬ 
less bootlegger who succumbs to the 
temptation of easy money. It fre¬ 
quently overmasters the very men 
charged with suppressing him. The 
dismissals from the service have too 
often told the story. There may be a 
“roll of honor,” as the Anti-Saloon 
League put it in publishing a list of 
federal agents who have lost their lives 
in fighting the bootleggers. A possible 
roll of dishonor was not mentioned. If 
the bribegiver in these instances be 


58 


The Annals of the American Academy 


even more despicable than the bribe¬ 
taker, the point here is merely that 
both succumb to a universal tempta¬ 
tion, which we may rail at as a human 
weakness, but must take account of if 
legislating wisely. It is no defence of 
the former legalized traffic to say that 
under it the same temptation to make 
cheap money by illicit selling was 
negligible, also because the smuggler 
and home-brewer could not compete 
with the regular producer. 

Of the Earth Earthy 

Another human element which pro¬ 
hibitive laws do not reckon with is the 
common appetite for stimulants. It 
may be a craving fed by constant in¬ 
dulgence, a constitutional weakness for 
any nerve excitant, or merely the knowl¬ 
edge of the pleasure of alcoholic stim¬ 
ulation. Then there is a temptation of 
the forbidden which is no unimportant 
factor. But why heap up evidence 
that the liquor vendor finds ever-ready 
customers. Their excessive number is 
sufficient proof. 

Inasmuch as prohibition assumes that 
greed for money and the appetite for 
stimulants will yield to force, it is based 
on a false understanding of human 
nature, or assumes that it can be made 
over by legislative fiat. And may one 
not go a bit farther and say that pro¬ 
hibition makes a psychological mistake 
in singling out a solitary human in¬ 
clination and treats not only an abuse 
of it, but also its rational indulgence, as 
a vice which can be eradicated by law? 
The answer seems to lie in the facile 
forgiveness extended by the general 
public to violations of prohibition. 

It is simply unthinkable that the 
temptation to make money by boot¬ 
legging would cease, could smuggling 
or intoxicants from foreign countries 
be stopped. For so long as the fruits of 
the orchard, the grain and roots of the 
fields remain, the distiller and home- 


brewer have an inexhaustible supply of 
the raw material for producing alcohol. 
It is a matter of common notoriety that 
we are becoming a nation of adepts in 
making intoxicants. As proof one need 
only cite the tremendous increase in the 
price of raisins, grapes, and apples since 
the advent of prohibition. Thus we 
may add to the score of inherent frailties 
of national prohibition by saying that 
it ignores plain economic fact. 

Crime and Its Followers Still 
Abroad 

Of far greater import is the confusion 
of moral values which appears to be in¬ 
separable from attempts to vindicate 
prohibition by force. In the eagerness 
to suppress a lesser evil, we are obliged 
to tolerate and to suffer from greater 
evils. If this seems to be a pretty 
fundamental accusation, let me hasten 
to justify it. 

On the credit side, national prohibi¬ 
tion has scored heavily by abolishing 
the open saloon. Leaving aside for the 
moment how much this means in terms 
of actual sobriety, savings of money, 
and of public morals, it is a momentous 
achievement to have convinced the 
country at large that the saloon no 
longer is a social necessity, and that the 
influence for which it has stood was 
uniformly bad. But when we weigh 
other less tangible gains from prohibi¬ 
tion, how do they balance? 

The once radiant dreams that crime, 
insanity, much poverty and disease 
would vanish with the advance of pro¬ 
hibition, have not materialized, and in 
the nature of things could not. 

The abuse of drink may be the con¬ 
comitant of much misconduct and 
social maladjustments of various kinds; 
but the commonly assumed causal re¬ 
lation between them is either non- 
extant or of minor consequence. If 
one were to apply the ordinary prohibi¬ 
tion measurement to the ills just men- 


Inherent Frailties of Prohibition 


59 


tioned, one of two conclusions would be 
irresistible: either drink is not the factor 
in human misconduct and misery 
generally supposed, or prohibition as 
exemplified in the United States has 
failed of its primary objects. For 
crime in its most terrible aspects is still 
as rampant as ever; the sad procession 
that wends its way to institutions for 
the insane, the feeble-minded, the 
sick or the helpless, gives no sign of 
diminishing; and poverty still stalks 
abroad. 

How Much Statistics Really Tell 

Why mass a tedious array of statis¬ 
tics in proof of negation since they can¬ 
not clarify the situation? We know 
that figures of consumption provide a 
means of gauging public sobriety. 
Obviously, under national prohibition, 
one cannot even guess at the per capita 
consumption of moonshine, or home¬ 
brew, and of smuggled goods. Statis¬ 
tics of arrests for intoxication tell little, 
since the seller of illicit wares certainly 
does not court investigation; and a man 
who abuses his own brew does not go 
out on the streets to proclaim it. On 
the other hand, the police records show 
in many places that arrests for drunk¬ 
enness are steadily climbing upward in 
many places, which is at least an alarm¬ 
ing symptom. 

The only social ailment which seems 
on the surface to lend itself to statis¬ 
tical scrutiny, is that of insanity. Ap¬ 
parently, the proportion of cases of 
alcohol insanity among first admission 
to hospitals shows a cheering decline. 
But may we safely count on its con¬ 
tinuation? The old roundes type of 
alcoholics seemed to have disappeared. 
It largely went under the Great War 
even in the drunk-ridden countries of 
Europe. 

With us the distressing fact appears 
to be that those who now receive treat¬ 
ment for alcoholism are predominantly 


young men. Many of them die, others 
become acutely deranged, and, in 
general, conditions betoken a large 
crop of alcoholic insanity cases which 
the future will harvest. And out of 
the ranks of the now incipient drinkers, 
we shall probably see the hobo and pan¬ 
handler emerge as of old. Their race 
shows unmistakable signs of rejuvena¬ 
tion in spite of prohibition. 

There is not even a slight comfort in 
the tabulations purporting to testify 
that applications for poor relief, par¬ 
ticularly as provided by private or¬ 
ganizations, are rapidly diminishing. 
Why should they not decline? Em¬ 
ployment has steadily improved for 
nearly two years; immigration is com¬ 
paratively negligible; the Govern¬ 
ment is annually spending hundreds of 
millions for the benefit of ex-service 
men and their dependents, to which 
must be added the generous largesse 
of states and municipalities. It is 
quite natural, therefore, that the 
pressure on private benevolence should 
have grown less acute. It is equally 
natural that the analysts of relief 
statistics should trace so little dis¬ 
tress to drink, for, believing as no 
doubt most of them do, that prohibi¬ 
tion has been the greatest benefactor 
of the poor, they are not prone to con¬ 
sider its failures, while formerly in¬ 
temperance was to them such a plausi¬ 
ble and self-evident cause of poverty. 

That there on the whole has been 
less drinking under national prohibi¬ 
tion is not greatly in point. The 
country is now, plainly speaking, on a 
whisky basis which does not make 
for sobriety. For years prior to pro¬ 
hibition a distinct trend toward greater 
moderation was visible throughout the 
United States. It is instructive that 
this trend has been decidedly marked 
both in France and England since the 
Great War, as official returns show; 
and there is no indication that it is 


60 


The Annals of the American Academy 


attributable solely to a decreased pur¬ 
chasing power. 

Lawlessness Very General 

But conceding that I have drawn 
the picture too darkly, and that I am 
incapable of evaluating the blessings 
that have appeared since the abolition 
of the saloon; at what cost have the 
supposed gains been bought? The 
whole country reverberates with an 
ever growing demand for the restitu¬ 
tion of law and order. Much of it 
is platitudinous preachment, without 
other substance than that inhering in 
most political rallying cries. Yet who 
can hide all alarm over the present 
reign of lawlessness? It obtrudes on 
every side and in every guise. There 
is no evidence that we as a people 
have of a sudden become criminally 
inclined. The apparent lawlessness is 
rather the symptom of psychological 
condition; it is an indication of a 
revolt against artificial restraints and 
regulations, according to which we 
are compelled to fashion the pattern 
of our lives. 

The commonest, often brutal, and 
the most brazen defiance of law is 
directed against prohibition. But the 
stories of murderous sale of poisonous 
liquor, rum piracy, spectacular gun 
fights with revenue agents, etc., are 
not the whole tale. A much less showy 
defiance of law and much more in¬ 
sidious in its effects, is the evidence 
which crops out in the refusal of grand 
juries to indict and of petty juries to 
convict, and which finds its largest ex¬ 
pression in the wholesale violations of 
prohibition, both in its letter and its 
spirit, by untold numbers who will 
not altogether be denied their drink. 
They abound among the well-placed 
and among the poor. When not long 
ago a certain governor of a state, at a 
gathering of club women, asked those 
of his hearers to arise who had to admit 


of violations of the Volstead Act by 
themselves or their families and other 
belongings, he mustered a goodly 
majority. Could the experiment be 
repeated in any representative gather¬ 
ing of men, including officials of gov¬ 
ernment, high exponents of the pro¬ 
fessions and of business affairs, how 
many Ihink you would be found 
blameless? The very thought savors 
of the grotesque. 

Disregard of All Law Follows 

But from direct participation in or 
connivance at violations of prohibition, 
it is not such a very far step to the 
thought: in case of need, what are 
the law and the Constitution among 
friends? The essence of the situa¬ 
tion is that the daily spectacle of 
a mighty government, embattled to 
uphold a law by greater force of men 
and money than has ever been put 
behind any other piece of social 
legislation, and doing it rather in¬ 
effectually, instils a subtle poison of 
disgust and contempt for law enforce¬ 
ment generally, which is subversive of 
all law and order. 

The root of the difficulty lies in the 
fact that the public has not given 
direct assent to national prohibition 
and does not believe in making the 
suppression of a single human appe¬ 
tite, which is capable of being held 
within harmless restraint, the supreme 
test of morality and virtue. Men 
have grown resentful against prohibi¬ 
tion, not merely for the inconvenience 
or deprivation it imposes on them 
personally, but because they sense 
how it confounds moral values. Im¬ 
placable hatred of drink per se does not 
of necessity spell the highest moral 
rectitude. There is much wisdom in 
the ancient saying, “Who hates vices, 
hates mankind.” A mild modern exe¬ 
gesis of it is that without a tolerant 
consideration for the frailties to which 


Inherent Frailties of Prohibition 


61 


we all are heirs, there can be no love 
of one’s fellows. 

The spectre of lawlessness on a 
closer view is thus a far more terrifying 
spectre than the most fervent pleaders 
for law and order picture it. How 
shall this ghost that haunts the dreams 
both of the governors and the gov¬ 
erned be laid: by more force, and 
through strengthening it by every 
means at the command of force? 
Men filled with resentment and the 
spirit of revolt cannot successfully be 
compelled to goose-step in the name 
of morality. Do we really need a new 
campaign of education? The Anti- 
Saloon League seems to think so, for 
it is reported that it intends to spend 
more than two million dollars during 
1924—in a campaign of political edu¬ 
cation, as it were. A slight reflection 
on this not unexpected tiding leads one 
to the observation that the menacing 
disgruntlement with prohibition is also 
an emphatic protest against political 
domination by an unregulated and 
fanatical band of paid reformers. In 
passing it deserves notice that this 
same band does not wish to insist that 
either of the major party insert a 
special plank on prohibition when 
building the next platform. This is 
considerate. Think how it would 
caricature the present state of en¬ 
forcement. 


A Way Out 

There is a way out of this painful, 
humiliating, besmirching and dan¬ 
gerous situation. Our President point¬ 
ed it in a speech discussing law enforce¬ 
ment. Organized society is success¬ 
ful, he said, “In proportion as laws 
are wise , as they represent deliberate 
and intelligent public opinion and as 
they are obeyed .” 

In applying the President’s remark 
to our present predicament, wdiat can 
be done? A first step should be to 
ascertain whether a popular endorse¬ 
ment of the Eighteenth Amendment 
will be given. This has never been 
properly tested. Therefore, there is 
reasonableness, there is practical wis¬ 
dom, there is the greatest urgency in 
the plea of the Constitutional Liberty 
League of Massachusetts for a popular 
referendum on prohibition. To decry 
this plea is stupid, to deny it, perilous, 
and to denounce it with belittlement 
of its spokesmen, immoral. 

When this just plea is made to pre¬ 
vail, the next safe step will announce 
itself. In governing ordinary human 
relationships, it is a happy procedure 
always to remove them from the dom¬ 
ination of men who, like the Bourbons 
of old, “retire to their ivory tower, 
wrapping themselves up in their noth¬ 
ingness, inaccessible to life.” 


Author’s Note: For full confirmation of the inherent frailties of national prohibition, see articles 
in the New York Times, July and August, 1923, by Roy A. Haynes, U. S. Prohibition Commissioner. 



State Rights and Prohibition 

By Henry W. Jessup, LL.B., J.D. 


I N the last analysis, the validity of 
all laws must be measured by the 
respect which they compel. Lincoln, 
in his Inaugural Address, referred to the 
belief by one section of our country 
that slavery was right, while the other 
believed it was wrong. He goes on: 
“The fugitive slave clause of the Con¬ 
stitution . . . (is) as well en¬ 

forced, perhaps, as any law can ever 
be in a community where the moral 
sense of the people imperfectly supports 
the law itself.” Laws which are 
penal derive respect from the efficiency 
with which they are enforced. Laws 
attended with penalties, which are 
based upon moral law, command 
respect to the extent that they are 
reasonable and within the rightful 
domain of the powers of the legisla¬ 
ture enacting them. 

In a democracy, whether conscious 
of the legal distinction or not, citizens 
do realize a difference between those 
laws that prohibit acts that are malum 
in se and those which are mala prohi- 
bita; that is to say, the conscience of 
every citizen recognizes the validity of 
laws prohibiting acts or conduct which 
are inherently wrong, yet if he does not 
believe the prohibited act to be in¬ 
herently wrong, one may readily 
imagine the citizen weighing the rela¬ 
tive advantage and disadvantage of 
obedience. 

Believing as he did that slavery was 
wrong, Lincoln, while, before Rebellion, 
he carried out his promise to enforce 
the Constitution, yet at the first op¬ 
portunity he asserted the right to deal 
with slaves of rebels considered as 
property, and so capable of confisca¬ 
tion, only to follow this by declaring 
them free, in spite of the constitu¬ 


tional protection afforded fugitive slave 
owners. 

And how many Christian citizens of 
that day, in spite of the law, worked in 
the Underground Railway to help 
fugitive slaves to freedom. They were 
abused and criticised, as the papers of 
that day clearly reveal. One “sta¬ 
tion” was at Montrose, Pa., where my 
grandfather lived—and some of the 
fugitives stayed there under the pro¬ 
tection of Christian people who vio¬ 
lated the Constitution and thus were 
guilty of lawbreaking. 

Again I have known persons, of the 
highest social, moral and church stand¬ 
ing, to fail to declare, on a return to 
this country, articles which they had 
purchased abroad and to deliberately 
weigh the chances of detection and the 
chances of escape with a fine in case of 
detection, preferring the pleasure of 
satisfaction in the few dollars saved, 
by what after all is technically as 
much smuggling as is the bringing of 
opium in through Canada, or as is the 
work of the rum runners of today. 
Do they lose caste? 

Rightful Development of State 
and Federal Government 

On the other hand, the right of a 
particular legislature, whether it be 
state or federal, to deal with the sub¬ 
ject of a particular law, is also a de¬ 
termining factor in the respect which 
should be paid to such law. This is 
probably more definitely clear in the 
mind of one trained in the study of our 
system of jurisprudence and the his¬ 
tory of governmental institutions than 
in the mind of the ordinary layman. 
Hence it is the function of lawyers, 
even at the risk of misunderstanding 


62 


State Rights and Prohibition 


63 


and abuse, if they are sincerely de¬ 
voted to the rightful development of 
our system of state and federal Gov¬ 
ernment, to keep this distinction clear 
before the minds of the people, even 
at the risk of painful iteration, or 
abuse. 

For, with our Government founded 
on a balance of powers, delegated or 
reserved, between the states and the 
nation, it was never the original pur¬ 
pose to give the federal Government 
the power to regulate or control the 
domestic affairs of citizens in the 
states. Sumptuary laws are out of 
their proper domain, however regular 
their genesis, and however imposing the 
majority by which they are enacted. 

Actual Merit Determining Factor 

For majorities are not always right. 
Take the settlement of the slavery 
issue. The people of the United 
States were morally right on the prop¬ 
osition that slavery was wrong. This 
fact justified the war that was fought 
to maintain that proposition, how¬ 
ever at first it may have been dis¬ 
guised; but it has not always been 
clear whether they were right after 
the war in the measures taken, as they 
believed, for the purpose of settling 
the issues that grew out of the abolition 
of slavery. To give to the freed men 
rights of citizenship and of franchise, 
seemed to be, at the time, the way to 
settle the question of his rights as a 
man in a free country, and solemnly 
and in due course, using the machinery 
set forth in the Constitution, amend¬ 
ments were adopted carrying out that 
policy. 

But there are today regions of this 
country, and they are regions in which 
respect for the Eighteenth Amendment 
is demanded on the grounds of moral¬ 
ity, good citizenship and respect for 
government, where these prior amend¬ 
ments are dead letters, where they are 


nullified, where the negro, thought to 
be a free man, is denied those rights 
which he had supposed these amend¬ 
ments had guaranteed him from the 
moment of their going into operation. 
This fact in and of itself, whatever its 
other implications may be, justifies 
the observation that, even in a democ¬ 
racy with a written constitution, the 
effectiveness of legislative enactments 
depends after all on their inherent 
right and reasonableness. The con¬ 
science of the North has not appar¬ 
ently been greatly aroused by nullifi¬ 
cation of these rights affecting the 
freedom of the negro in the South. 
Certainly nothing is being done about 
it. 

Our Chief Executive, when announc¬ 
ing that the United States Government 
was going to enforce the Eighteenth 
Amendment, because it was law, was 
silent and did nothing in respect to the 
earlier amendment. Does one amend¬ 
ment differ from another amendment 
in sacro sanctitude? Passing to this 
question of prohibition, from the 
standpoint of legislation, we find simi¬ 
larly that, owing to the curse of alco¬ 
holism, the vice of intemperance, the 
failure of effective prohibition in local¬ 
ities where, under local option the 
efforts of those who believed in pro¬ 
hibition were rendered nugatory by 
the absence of cooperation by the fed¬ 
eral Government, public opinion was 
aroused to the point of demanding 
that the federal Government pro¬ 
hibit not only liquor traffic but the 
actual personal consumption of intox¬ 
icating beverages; and the Eighteenth 
Amendment was adopted and, as has 
been held by the Supreme Court, 
it was duly made a part of the 
Constitution of the United States. 
The contention is that this was no 
proper function of our federal Govern¬ 
ment. It marked a new departure in 
experimentation, and may lead to a 


64 


The Annals of the American Academy 


complete change in the relation of cit¬ 
izens of the states to the federal Gov¬ 
ernment. 

The Congress undertook to legislate 
at the foot of the Amendment and, be 
it said with all deference, it went be¬ 
yond the spirit of the Amendment as 
embodied in its text. It fixed an arbi¬ 
trary, and therefore inexact, percentage 
in defining what is “intoxicating” liquor. 
Then, by permitting bureaucratic reg¬ 
ulation, it went still further wrong. 

This attempt in some respects, e.g ., 
in the case of denial to physicians of a 
right inherent in the very nature of 
their profession to prescribe as they 
might individually be advised for their 
patients, has been declared void by the 
courts. An elaborate machinery was 
set up for the purpose of enforcing 
this prohibitory measure and subordi¬ 
nate agents of Government were given 
powers to construe, apply and enforce 
the Act, which powers have been arbi¬ 
trarily and not always honestly exer¬ 
cised. 

With the abuses in the operation of 
this machinery the public in the United 
States has become reasonably familiar. 
Every lawyer can quote instances of 
honest and honorable clients having a 
right, recognized after due inquiry and 
decision, to the use of alcohol in manu¬ 
facturing, held up by corrupt federal 
agents, refused inspection and permit 
and finally informed that a favorable 
annual report necessary to the re¬ 
newal of their license will cost so much. 

Even the better class of prohibi¬ 
tionists felt outraged when Volstead 
agents undertook to search the per¬ 
sons of people in trains or in cars on 
mere suspicion and without warrant. 
Agent after agent has been removed 
and replaced in the attempt to secure 
an absolutely honest administration 
of the prohibition measure. 

Is it unfair to assume that one reason 
why there is and must always be diffi¬ 


culty in the administration of such a 
measure by the federal Government is 
that there is a very widespread con¬ 
viction that the whole matter is one 
in which the federal Government has 
no right, within the underlying theory 
of our republic, to interfere? 

The Pitfall of a Sumptuary Law 

I listened to a debate in which Mr. 
Wayne B. Wheeler, general counsel 
for this prohibition activity, w r as asked 
the question wdiether he would con¬ 
sent to or approve of a resettlement of 
this question, giving to each state, or 
rather yielding to each state, its right 
locally to adopt prohibition of the 
sale or consumption of liquor within 
its bounds and leave to the federal 
Government, under its right to con¬ 
trol interstate commerce, the right to 
regulate, prohibit or tax to the limit, 
the transportation into any such state 
having a prohibition law, of any article 
falling within the category of intoxi¬ 
cating liquors as defined by the law" of 
that state. He said he w r ould not 
approve such a plan. His contention 
w 7 as that it had been in effect tried and 
had failed. His intolerance is almost 
as arrogant as that of Mr. Anderson. 

He did not take into consideration 
the fact that the rights of the federal 
Government, in that respect, had not 
been made clear at that time and that, 
on the other hand, there w r as not made 
available such a machinery of law 
enforcement as has now been evoked 
in aid of a measure violating the con¬ 
victions of many law-abiding citizens, 
that the federal Government is trying 
to deal w r ith questions that are not 
properly within its regulatory powers. 

Had the money and men, employed 
under the Volstead Act, been made 
available under the “original package” 
law, we w r ould have had ideal local 
option. Unless w T e are to abandon all 
question of the rights of the states, 


State Rights and Prohibition 


65 


within their own jurisdiction, to deal 
with their citizens, and regulate, if need 
be, their domestic affairs, and unless we 
are frankly ready to become a nation 
rather than a republic consisting of 
independent states, we must realize 
that if the federal Government has the 
right to make a sumptuary law of any 
description, it will have a right to make 
sumptuary laws of every description. 
Why may it not say what we shall eat, 
as well as what we shall drink, or where¬ 
withal we shall be clothed? 

Let the Law Be Repealed 

I ventured to express my views with 
regard to the attitude of many good 
Christian people in The Outlook of 
May 16, which attitude I character¬ 
ized as unreasonable and pharisaical 
in so far as they criticised as unchris¬ 
tian the attempt by men having some 
knowledge of our system of govern¬ 
ment and who were thus disturbed as 
to the tendency of this growth of federal 
interference in the private life of the 
citizen to secure a reexamination of 
the question and who were working 
to secure some amendment or mod¬ 
ification of the law by Congress. I 
received letters of commendation, to 
be sure, from all parts of the country, 
but an equal number from this country 
and abroad characterized me as a friend 
of the saloon, and as ignorant of the 
curse of intemperance. They were filled 
some of them with the grossest abuse, 
and in some cases, called down outra¬ 
geous curses upon my devoted head; 
emphasizing, however, the unreason of 
their mental attitude and their entire 
misconception of the purpose of the 
article. 

On moral grounds it is my con¬ 
tention that prohibition does not 
develop character. Self-control and 
temperance is the teaching of the 
Bible as to matters that are not malum 
in se. Being personally constrained 


under an oath to support the Con¬ 
stitution of the United States, I am in 
obedience to the law, but am horrified 
at the attitude of many persons of far 
better standing and repute than my¬ 
self who are prosecuting the search 
for “reliable bootleggers” and who 
keep their private stock undiminished 
though constantly consumed. Why 
have I not the right and why am I not 
under the moral duty of using all in¬ 
fluence I possess to secure a modifica¬ 
tion of a statute, which I believe to be 
in derogation of the rights of the citi¬ 
zens of the states and try to put this 
question of temperance on the right 
basis? 

A most illuminating article on the 
futility of prohibition appeared in the 
New York Medical Journal, showing the 
increase in alcoholism, from hospital 
records, since 1920. Let the law as it 
now stands be repealed, leave to the 
states the exercise of the right, under 
principles of local option and of state’s 
rights, to pass measures of prohibition, 
to define what is “intoxicating,” or to 
tax or otherwise regulate the use or con¬ 
sumption of alcohol. Let the federal 
Government tax to the blue sky limit 
the importation of intoxicating liquors 
into the United States and let it enforce, 
by penal machinery and penalty, the 
violation of the sanctity of any state 
adopting prohibition against the inter¬ 
state, transportation of the forbidden 
commodities. Under its conceded pow¬ 
ers let it control and punish the poi¬ 
soners who make and distribute wood 
alcohol liquors. Thus may the states 
cooperate and the citizen of any given 
state, having done his duty as he saw 
it, in permitting the adoption of the 
local statutes by his representatives in 
the state, legislature, would be deprived 
of this feeling that the Volstead Act, 
operating on his personal rights, was an 
act of a government that had no right 
to interfere in those personal rights. 


6 


66 


The Annals of the American Academy 


In Conclusion 

To sum up: (1) A statute of per¬ 
manent validity must appeal to the 
citizen as being reasonable; as relating 
to a matter within the power of the 
legislature to regulate; and it must 
be enforced honestly and by honest 
men. 

(2) The federal Government should 
not interfere in regulating the personal 
domestic habits or liberties of citizens 
of the states. 

(3) The original statement of the 
powers of the national Government 
ought to limit the operation of any 
subsequent amendment to the Con¬ 
stitution, and restrict them in their 
enforcement. 


(4) The failure to enact concurrent 
regulations, or the actual repeal of 
legislation previously enacted by any 
particular state, is a matter of moral 
interest in this sense only: that the 
concurrent powers given to the states 
to enforce the Eighteenth Amendment 
are permissive. The states cannot be 
compelled by the Government to 
adopt any particular statute, so that 
they remain in this respect as in any 
other respect over which they have 
power to legislate, free in every par¬ 
ticular. Prohibition does not prohibit. 
The harsher enforcement measures 
become, the sooner will the issue come 
to a head. The great American rule 
is not so much to settle a question as 
to “Settle it Right.” 


“The Non-Effectiveness of the Volstead Act ” 1 


By Senator Walter E. Edge 

Former Governor of New Jersey, 1917-20 


T HREE and a half years ago, fol¬ 
lowing the adoption of the Eight¬ 
eenth, better known as the Prohibition, 
Amendment, Congress passed the now- 
famous Volstead Act. 

I was a member of that Congress. 

I opposed its adoption. May I ven¬ 
ture the conviction that three and a 
half years’ experience under the pro¬ 
visions of the Act has not altered my 
mind? May I modestly observe rather 
it has confirmed my judgment of that 
time? 

I am here tonight to discuss the 
failure of that Act; not the wisdom of 
the adoption of the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment. On the latter subject, of course, 
possible arguments are almost without 
limit. 

Let us not confuse the two things. 
The Eighteenth Amendment is now 
written into the Constitution of the 
United States. It is a mandate from 
the people of the country and our first 
duty is to make every effort to have it 
enforced. The Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment prohibits the manufacture, sale, 
or transportation of intoxicating bev¬ 
erages. The language is plain and 
cannot be misunderstood. 

On the other hand, the Volstead Act 
is an act of Congress subject to amend¬ 
ment and change as a majority of Con¬ 
gress elects. It was passed for the 
purpose of carrying out the provisions 
of the Eighteenth Amendment. It 
provides, among many other things, 
that no beverage shall be legal that 
contains over one half of one per cent 
of alcohol. In other words, it arbi- 

1 Speech of Senator Walter E. Edge, in his 
discussion with former Assemblyman George A. 
Hobart, April 24, 1923. 


trarily infers that beverages of over 
this percentage are intoxicating. 

Present Situation Worse 

Of course, we all appreciate the in¬ 
tent of the Eighteenth Amendment, 
with the subsequent passage of the 
Volstead Act, was to overcome the 
recognized harmful effect of intoxica¬ 
tion. The object was a laudable one, 
and beneficial results might have been 
obtained if the Constitution had been 
interpreted in a fair and equitable 
manner. However, because of this 
unjust regulatory measure, entirely 
contrary to constitutional mandate, 
and the consequent subterfuges em¬ 
ployed to evade the law, the present 
situation is developing as harmful 
effects as existed in the old days. 
Worse, in fact, because it is combining 
with intoxication alcohol poisoning in 
its worse form and encouraging a gen¬ 
eral contempt for all law that is threat¬ 
ening the very foundations of our demo¬ 
cratic form of government. 

Relief cannot be obtained through 
railing at or berating the Constitution. 
That is not my intention. The Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment should be enforced. 
How to make it effective is our problem. 
To blindly insist on impossibilities is 
not only poor statesmanship, but stub¬ 
born inconsistency. 

I am not opposed to law enforcement. 
On the contrary , I am endeavoring to 
make it possible. In seeking relief we 
are not violating the Constitution. I 
contend that term better fits those who 
insist that the Volstead Act is war¬ 
ranted by either the terms or the spirit 
of the Constitution. 

The admitted failure, however, to 


67 


68 


The Annals of the American Academy 


enforce the Volstead Act has developed 
a general contempt and lack of respect 
for law and order which demands the 
serious attention of those in authority. 
All who refuse to try to find a remedy 
must now divide responsibility with 
the bootlegger, who today is the strong¬ 
est and most strenuous opponent of 
improved conditions. Sincere citizens 
in all walks of life should abandon the 
growing evil of hypocrisy and come for¬ 
ward with their honest views. It is in¬ 
defensible to condone the present condi¬ 
tions and no real friend of temperance 
will do so. 

Many representatives of the Anti- 
Saloon League seem to feel they cannot 
make an effective argument unless they 
preface their position by deliberate 
misrepresentation or personal abuse. 
I congratulate Mr. Hobart for not 
adopting that policy. The main oc¬ 
cupation of some of those who are 
retained professionally to insist that the 
Volstead Act is a sacred instrument is 
to conduct a campaign of personalities 
and accusations. All who disagree 
with them are rumhounds, brewers’ 
agents, or worse. Recently, however, 
these paid representatives of the “non¬ 
political” Anti-Saloon League have 
been kept rather busy defending their 
own activities and in some cases have 
presented rather pathetic figures when 
it has been demonstrated to a shocked 
world that all the virtue is not theirs. 

A Sincere Endeavor to Rectify 

My friends , no man in this great 
liberty-loving country of ours can ever be 
adjudged as treasonable when he makes a 
sincere effort to rectify a situation that 
every honest man or woman must admit 
is encouraging and developing a disre¬ 
spect for law which threatens the absolute 
destruction of the institutions of free 
government. 

Excessively repressive laws unless 
based upon common sense and common 


consent have never been successful. 
We are a law-abiding nation, or were 
until the Volstead Act unjustly 
abridged our liberties. 

I am here as a member of Congress, 
the only body having real legislative 
jurisdiction in the matter, to pledge 
every effort to endeavor to alleviate 
this condition, which should be even 
more objectionable to those who orig¬ 
inally inspired the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment than to those who perhaps 
doubted its wisdom. 

I am always glad to have an oppor¬ 
tunity to discuss important public 
policies with my constituents. I only 
ask, however, that those who listen will 
at least listen with open minds. 

Contentions Submitted 

I contend: 

(1) That the Republic exists only by 
the consent of the people. They 
created and maintain the Constitution. 
Congress is tlieir servant. Without 
their respect and obedience to the laws 
—which their Congress has enacted— 
there can be no democratic govern¬ 
ment. 

(2) That lawlessness and disrespect 
for law are rampant throughout the 
nation; that it is the patriotic duty of 
all good citizens and especially of those 
in high public office to seek the funda¬ 
mental reasons for this deplorable con¬ 
dition; to alleviate the cause or causes 
and to recommend and apply a remedy. 

(3) That the Volstead Act is fla¬ 
grantly and openly violated by large 
numbers of our citizens of all classes, 
who, in their daily lives, are good men; 
typical Americans, who are otherwise 
loyal to the principles of our institu¬ 
tions. That they are not generally 
indifferent to the prosperity, happiness 
and security of our country is admitted. 
Therefore, all the wrong cannot be with 
such citizens. Personally, I believe 
that one of the prime causes of this 


“The Non-Effectiveness of the Volstead Act” 


69 


unrest is in certain highly controversial 
provisions of the Volstead Act. 

(4) That the only subject matter 
prohibited by the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment is intoxicating liquors for bever¬ 
age purposes; that the Volstead Act, in 
framing a definition of what shall con¬ 
stitute an intoxicating beverage and 
thus limiting alcoholic contents to one 
half of one per cent, deliberately vio¬ 
lates the spirit and the plainly ex¬ 
pressed language of the Eighteenth 
Amendment, and states as a fact that 
which is admittedly false. 

(5) That if the framers of the 
Amendment had meant to prohibit 
alcoholic beverages, they would have 
said so and not used the term intoxi¬ 
cating beverages; that no law can com¬ 
mand respect or properly be enforced 
so long as it violates, upon its face, the 
canons of fact and truth. The Su¬ 
preme Court in passing on the Act 
never indicated that Congress did not 
have full power to raise the percentage 
of alcohol. What is intoxicating is 
entirely within the discretion of Con¬ 
gress. 

(6) That because Congress has the 
power to enact unjust and oppressive 
laws is no excuse for the use of such 
power. Possession of power does not 
always justify its use. Congress could 
use its power of taxation to absolutely 
destroy business, but would the right 
to exercise such power justify its use? 
Because Congress had the power to 
enact the Volstead Act is no excuse for 
its arbitrary, oppressive, and false 
provisions. 

(7) That prior to the enactment of 
the Volstead Act, no law of Congress, 
no ruling of any federal department, 
and no finding of any federal official 
ever determined that one half of one 
per cent of alcohol in a beverage con¬ 
stituted an intoxicating liquor. The 
use of the federal standard of one half 
of one per cent of alcohol to fermented 


liquors was applied only and exclusively 
for the purpose of taxation. 

But when the citizens of the United 
States ratified the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment, they said that the prohibition 
therein contained should alone be 
against “intoxicating liquors,” not alco¬ 
holic liquors. This is plain and simple 
language which every citizen fully 
understood. 

Because the states could, and certain 
of them have, prohibited the sale and 
use of beverages that contain one half 
of one per cent of alcohol, and certain 
others, beverages that contain no alco¬ 
hol at all, in no possible manner justi¬ 
fied Congress in framing a federal 
statute, carrying out a clearly expressed 
mandate from the people, to overstep 
the intent of the Amendment and 
deliberately prohibit “ non-intoxicating 
liquors . . . for beverage purposes ” 

A modification of the Volstead Act 
so as to permit of the use of beverages 
containing more than one half of one 
per cent of alcohol, but not, in fact, 
intoxicating, would not in anywise 
interfere with the right or power of any 
state, so desiring, to prohibit beverages 
containing as much as one half of one 
per cent of alcohol; nor would such 
change in the Volstead Act interfere 
with any of the prohibitory and en¬ 
forcement legislation which the states 
now have on their statute books. Each 
state would still be as free to deal with 
prohibition and its enforcement as it is 
today. If it wished to raise the alco¬ 
holic content of non-intoxicating bev¬ 
erages to a point not beyond the- limi¬ 
tation of a revised Volstead Act, 
properly interpreting the Eighteenth 
Amendment, it could do so. It could 
refrain from doing so. It could make 
its prohibitory legislation still more 
stringent if the desires of its people so 
required, but it could not force its will 
upon others. 

(8) The proponents of the Volstead 


70 


The Annals of the American Academy 




Act did not contend that beer contain¬ 
ing one half of one per cent of alcohol 
was intoxicating or near intoxicating. 
Time after time, throughout the public 
hearings, when the Act was under con¬ 
sideration three and a half years ago, 
appears the statement, “ We are asking 
for a limit of one half of one per cent in 
order to accomplish the end in view.” 
Dr. Shields, who suggested this discus¬ 
sion tonight, only a few weeks ago, 
when in a controversy with my friend, 
Governor Stokes, stated, 

Congress never said one half of one per 
cent was intoxicating when it established 
it as the standard for the enforcement of 
the Eighteenth Amendment. It was and 
is a good point from which to start to en¬ 
force the Amendment. 

They had their way and note the 
results. 

Do I need to quote any other author¬ 
ities? Is there any possible excuse for 
the federal Government continuing to 
spend many millions of dollars a year 
to enforce a deliberate misinterpreta¬ 
tion of the Constitution? 

In view of the existing and universal 
disregard of an unfair and unjust 
stipulation, why do they not acknowl¬ 
edge their error and the failure of the 
policy they then advised? 

(9) That this arbitrary limitation, 
therefore, precludes the manufacture 
of beverages admittedly non-intoxi¬ 
cating. In doing this the Volstead 
Act not only deliberately violates the 
expressed language and spirit of the 
Eighteenth Amendment, but it breeds 
class prejudice. It denies to a large 
proportion of our citizens a harmless 
popular beverage, while, as is well 
known, those with sufficient means can, 
with the greatest ease, secure intoxi¬ 
cating liquors which are clearly pro¬ 
hibited by the Eighteenth Amendment. 

Thus, we are building up a nation¬ 
wide industry in smuggling, rum¬ 


running and bootlegging, stimulating 
the consumption of alcohol in its worst 
form. Almost uncontrolled this has 
developed the most serious of all 
menaces, class distinction, under which 
the rich are provided with illegal intoxi¬ 
cants and others denied anything but 
injurious home brew, originating and 
encouraging domestic barrooms, pro¬ 
viding concoctions that have broken 
down the public health and caused 
unspeakable suffering and fatalities. 
This condition is doing more to foment 
anarchy and communism than any¬ 
thing else that is happening in the 
country. 

No law should remain unchanged 
upon the statute books of the nation 
that does not breathe truth from every 
provision and every line. You cannot 
enforce or encourage respect for a law 
that does not itself respect the truth. 
Enforce the Eighteenth Amendment— 
yes—but do not violate the canons of 
truth or the intent—and spirit of the 
Constitution, itself—in attempting to 
do so. 

(10) That the Volstead Act became 
a law on October 28, 1919. Violations 
under it have increased year by year, 
and today they are more widespread 
and more flagrant than ever. The 
Prohibition Department in Washing¬ 
ton itself recently admitted that arrests 
during the last six months last year 
had increased over 25 per cent. 

As a result of this lawlessness we are 
breeding a national contempt of all 
law. This condition has largely con¬ 
tributed in encouraging organized out¬ 
breaks of various kinds in all parts of 
the country, many unpunished, and 
the like of which were unknown before 
this spirit of national protest and 
challenge was developed. 

(11) That statistics are misleading 
is generally admitted. The supply 
supporting most any contention is in¬ 
exhaustible. Therefore, I will not 






“The Non-Effectiveness of the Volstead Act ’ 5 


71 


attempt to cite them at length. An 
official report, published by Dr. Cot¬ 
ton, Superintendent of the State Hos¬ 
pital at Trenton, states that 51 per 
cent of his cases today are alcoholic, 
where formerly the average was 21 per 
cent and the highest at any time was 31 
per cent. Here in the city of Newark, 
a local newspaper published figures 
recently setting forth that the total 
alcoholic cases admitted to the city 
hospital had increased from 357 in 
1919 to 1,088 in 1921, and in eleven 
months of 1922 had jumped to the 
astounding figures of 1,518. 

The keeper of the Mercer County 
jail advises me that the total number 
of commitments to that institution for 
the year 1919 (the year prohibition was 
adopted) was 852, daily average, 55. 

The total number of commitments 
for the year 1922 (after three years of 
prohibition) 1,259, daily average 70. 
An increase of over 30 per cent. 

Further, in this connection, it is 
generally agreed that the addicts to the 
drug habit have never been so large as 
during recent months. 

Common sense and personal observa¬ 
tion, it seems to me, are sufficient for 
any reasonable person to recognize that 
there are violations on every hand, 
with bootleggers carrying on their illicit 
traffic almost unrestrained, and hard 
liquors and drugs easily obtainable. 
Under such admitted conditions to 
profess satisfaction with the present 
deplorable situation, via the avenue of 
statistics, is a libel on intelligence. 

(12) That with all the admitted 
failure to enforce this Act, we have 
overworked the federal courts until 
today 60 per cent of all the business of 
these courts consists of efforts to pun¬ 
ish a few offenders, but in the mean¬ 
time, violations have steadily increased. 

(13) That since the enactment of 
the Volstead Act, Congress has in¬ 
creased its appropriations for enforce¬ 


ment purposes from $3,000,000 in 1919 
to $9,000,000 in 1924, thus clearly 
demonstrating that there has been no 
reasonable lack of support on the part 
of Congress to enforce the law. For 
the first time in the 134 years of 
constitutional government it has been 
necessary for Congress to create a 
federal police force with thousands of 
policemen to endeavor to enforce just 
one law—the Volstead Act. 

(14) That the unfairness of it has 
encouraged the organization of un- 
American-like aggregations which hith¬ 
erto never dared operate. Mob vio¬ 
lence, contempt for law and courts, 
unpunished crimes and resistance to 
constitutional government has never 
been so universal. 

(15) That in the zeal of some to 
make the Volstead Act even more 
drastic, notwithstanding the glaring 
inability to enforce the original Act, 
an amendment was secured forbidding 
the use of malt liquor in cases of sick¬ 
ness and cutting down the use of alco¬ 
hol for medicinal purposes to a degree 
which was a gratuitous insult to the 
honesty and trustworthiness of the 
great medical profession of the country 
and protested against by thousands of 
doctors throughout the nation. 

(16) That by passing and maintain¬ 
ing the Volstead Act in such a repres¬ 
sive, arbitrary and untruthful form, we 
have helped destroy such good and 
efficient results as might have resulted 
when temperance was adopted as a 
national policy. In attempting to 
enforce a measure not in harmony with 
the plain terms of the Eighteenth 
Amendment itself, we have, as a con¬ 
sequence, encouraged the widespread 
and determined resistance and chal¬ 
lenge which is now so apparent. 

(17) That we, who maintain that 
the Volstead Act should be modified 
within the prohibition of the Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment, only emulate the 





72 


The Annals of the American Academy 


example of Abraham Lincoln in his 
attitude and speeches on the decision 
of the United States Supreme Court in 
the famous Dred Scott case. In his 
argument against the finality of that 
decision, he pointed out that he was 
not violating the law or urging its 
violation. Lincoln did not propose to 
set Dred Scott free by force in opposi¬ 
tion to the Court’s decision; what he did 
propose, however, was to agitate and to 
lead an agitation for such political 
action as would make impossible the 
conditions which led the Supreme 
Court to make its decision in that 
particular case. It is lawless openly 
to affront the law. It is not lawless to 
agitate for its consistent modification. 
That is my position. 

President Wilson vetoed the Act and 
twenty Senators, representing almost 
equally both political parties, voted to 
uphold his veto. I was one of the 
twenty that so voted in 1919, believing 
then, and so announcing, that the Act 
was unfair, unworkable and an un¬ 
necessarily severe interpretation of the 
Eighteenth Amendment. National 
characters like Senators Borah, Bran- 
degee, Fall (afterwards a Cabinet mem¬ 
ber), Hitchcock, Underwood (the for¬ 
mer Democratic leader), Robinson (the 
present Democratic leader), and others 
were among those who challenged the 
accusation that they were nullifica- 
tionists because they disagreed with 
the terms of the Volstead Act. After 
three and a half years of downright 
failure to successfully administer the 
law, I certainly have nothing to with¬ 
draw. 

Was the Act so sacred that the 
President of the United States was 
guilty of treason when he vetoed it? 
Were the twenty Senators, representing 
about equally each political party, 
treasonable when they voted to uphold 
his veto? 

Is a Senator, after an added knowl¬ 


edge of three and a half years of dismal 
failure, treasonable today when he 
seeks a remedy? 

The Remedy 

The remedy of those who recognize 
existing conditions is that the Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment should be written 
into the Volstead Act, rather than 
have the Volstead Act remain a clear, 
deliberate violation of the plain lan¬ 
guage of the Eighteenth Amendment. 

In other words, return to the people 
the right to have the beverages to which 
they have been accustomed over the 
centuries and for which they have 
been offered no satisfactory substitute. 
Limit the alcoholic content of such 
beverages to that which is not, in fact, 
intoxicating, but because one state may 
wish to prohibit all alcoholic beverages 
do not deny the right to others to per¬ 
mit and enjoy such a maximum. You 
will then have brought the law of Con¬ 
gress into harmony with the Constitu¬ 
tion, restored truth to its pages, and 
removed, in great measure, the chal¬ 
lenge of all classes of our best and 
otherwise law-respecting and law-abid¬ 
ing citizens. They believe, and rightly, 
that this is an abridgment and denial 
of their personal liberty under an 
unwarranted, arbitrary and oppressive 
act of Congress, passed in violation of 
the mandate given by the citizens of 
the United States when they adopted 
the Eighteenth Amendment. 

Such action of Congress will not 
restore the saloon. No one endorses 
that. Congress and the several states 
have and possess the amplest powers 
to provide how such non-intoxicating 
beverages may be sold, distributed and 
where used. At the same time, put all 
the power of the Government back of 
real efforts to stop the importation of 
hard liquors. We shall never get pro¬ 
hibition by hunting flasks. We must 
go after the smugglers, the rum runners 


“The Non-Effectiveness of the Volstead Act” 


73 


and the Canadian specials. A more 
contented citizenship will help con¬ 
tribute to such a result. You cannot 
deny them reasonable liberty and at 
the same time enlist them under the 
banner of law observance. 

I don’t claim that this plan will 
entirely eliminate the bootlegger or 
finally stop hard liquor consumption. 
Of course it won’t. But if it is the 
honest thing to do, it should be done. 
In my judgment, as has resulted in 
Great Britain and elsewhere, the legal 
right to manufacture and consume a 
palatable beer would greatly reduce 
the use of hard liquor and at least 
demonstrate to the public that their 
Government no longer proposed to 
perpetuate a lie. If the public cannot 
buy beer they do and will buy poison 
alcoholic substitutes. 

Therefore, with these counts and 
indictments, I stand before a repre¬ 
sentative audience of my constituents, 
unhesitatingly contending that I would 
fail in my duty as a legislator should I 
not take cognizance of these conditions 
and make every possible effort to 
remedy an intolerable situation. I 
refuse to sit supinely by and make no 
legislative effort to alleviate and correct 
this indefensible and serious menace, 
which permitted to continue unchecked 
is fraught with the gravest danger to 
my country. 

Representative Law Abiders Now 
Law Violators 

Among the many disturbing features 
of this nation-wide failure at enforce¬ 
ment is the realization of the fact that 
the real violators of the Volstead Act 
are not what is generally termed the 
common people or the general average 
of citizenship, but the so-called best 
element. Men and women who have 
been leaders in civic movements, in 
industry and finance, in art and litera¬ 
ture, and in the constructive activities 


of the nation, are almost daily violators 
of this unfair law', and it is idle for us 
to attempt to deceive ourselves as to 
that fact. 

It is not a question of what’s wrong 
with the people, but what’s wrong 
with the law, and no man can longer 
defend himself who refuses to make an 
effort at least to remedy it, especially 
when the possibilities and the method 
and the way is so clear. 

What Is the Real Question? 

It is not always a question alone of 
the pow r er of Congress. One must con¬ 
sider just how far that power should be 
exercised for the good of the public. 
When one has unlimited power, it be¬ 
comes all the more necessary to exer¬ 
cise that power wisely and justly. 

A very much larger question is pre¬ 
sented than even a debate as to the 
fairness or unfairness of the Volstead 
Act. A democratic nation cannot en¬ 
dure when a majority oppress a minor¬ 
ity. It is a well-known fact that the 
fundamental design of the Constitution 
is not to govern, but rather to limit the 
power of majorities. Destruction of 
personal liberty beyond a certain point 
necessarily nourishes the spirit of 
rebellion. 

Neither is it a question of the legal¬ 
ity of the Volstead Act. Everyone 
knows the Supreme Court has upheld 
the measure, but in doing so, the Court 
clearly indicated that Congress alone 
must decide what was an intoxicating 
beverage. The Court in no way sug¬ 
gested that Congress was limited in this 
regard beyond their own discretion. 

Is it not reasonable to assume that, if 
the framers of the Constitutional 
Amendment had meant to have pro¬ 
hibited the use of all alcoholic bever¬ 
ages, the Amendment would have 
read “no alcoholic beverages,” instead 
of as it does read, “no intoxicating 
beverages?” 


74 


The Annals of the American Academy 


I contend, backed by many authori¬ 
ties and investigations and many tests, 
that the alcoholic contents of beer can 
be greatly increased and still be abso¬ 
lutely within the limitations of the 
word “intoxicating liquors,” as used in 
the Constitution. 

To me, in view of present intolerable 
conditions, it is absolutely amazing 
that clear-thinking, sincere, intelligent 
Americans would defend the Act, or, as 
some have done, denounce as treason¬ 
able those who seek its improvement. 
In 1919, when the Act was passed, its 
proponents plead that the percentage 
of alcohol should be less than admitted 
as intoxicating, in order, as they 
argued, that the manufacture and use 
would be discouraged. They had their 
way. After three years of effort their 
theory has been completely dissipated 
and a great majority of unbiased clear- 
thinking people demand a remedy. 

What Statistics Show 

Most statistics are misleading and I 
will not attempt to argue by their 
presentation in any detail. Ogden 
Chisolm, the well-known social worker 
and recognized prison reform authority, 
has published an array of figures which 
he vouches for; that Sing Sing Prison 
has seen an increase in dope fiends in 
two years of 780 per cent. That is, 
where there were ten dope fiends there 
are now 78. That in a year, Nebraska 
and Rhode Island have doubled their 
prison records. That Leavenworth 
has jumped from 1,700 to 2,200; that 
drunkenness in six of the large cities of 
New York has increased from 40 per 
cent to 100 per cent. That murders 
have increased from 24 to 46 a day in 
the United States. 

It is alleged that America uses over 
seven times as much narcotic drugs as 
any other country on the face of the 
globe. Not just seven times as much, 
either, but seven times as much in pro¬ 


portion to the population. Justice 
McDuffey recently advised the Grand 
Jury in session that there were 30,000 
drug addicts in Philadelphia alone. 
Can anyone deny that this habit has 
not been enhanced because of the dif¬ 
ficulty among a large proportion of our 
citizenship to secure a moderate bev¬ 
erage? 

I do not doubt that those defending 
the operation of the Volstead Act will 
present an array of figures which they 
will claim to give encouragement the 
other way. In fact you can’t beat 
them. When statistics show in some 
sections increased arrests, the efficiency 
of the Prohibition Department is 
emphasized. If the contrary is the 
report, then it marks decreased defiance 
of the law. You can take your choice. 

As far as I am concerned, however, I 
am not greatly influenced by statistics 
furnished by either side of this con¬ 
troversy. 

Intoxicating Not Non-Alcoholic 

Among the arguments frequently 
advanced as evidence of the helpful 
effects of attempted prohibition are 
tables of balances in savings banks and 
other financial institutions. Balances 
in banks have had a habit of increasing 
and improving from period to period 
ever since America became a republic. 
Don’t deceive yourself by thinking you 
are saving the workingman. He pays 
now for a deadly concoction many 
times as much as he formerly paid for 
pure beer. You cannot alter a man’s 
habits by saying, “Thou shalt not.” 
You can only have influence in this 
connection by a campaign of education. 
As a matter of record, before prohibi¬ 
tion went into effect, there had been a 
steady decline in the use of ardent 
spirits and the substitution therefor of 
beer. Consumption of whisky reached 
its lowest point, according to statistics, 
just before the Volstead Act went into 


“The Non-Effectiveness of the Volstead Act” 


75 


effect, and while the 3 per cent war 
beer was allowed. 

At the Senate Committee hearings, 
when the Volstead Act was under con¬ 
sideration, the results of many ex¬ 
haustive tests were presented. These 
tests consisted mainly of careful ob¬ 
servations of the effect upon many 
subjects after drinking beer with a 
percentage of 2.75 alcohol by weight, 
equivalent to over 3 per cent by vol¬ 
ume. These tests were conducted by 
some of the best known medical and 
scientific authorities in the country, 
including Professor Hare, who for 28 
years has been the professor of thera¬ 
peutics in the Jefferson Medical Col¬ 
lege of Philadelphia; by John Marshall, 
Professor of Chemistry and Toxicology 
in the University of Pennsylvania for 
over 20 years and Dean of the Faculty 
of Medicine there for ten years. Tests 
were also made by various others whose 
positions in the country cannot be 
successfully assailed. These men all 
testified that, after numerous tests 
upon all classes of human subject, they 
were convinced it was impossible to 
become intoxicated by a consumption 
of beer with this percentage of alcohol. 

If the framers of the Eighteenth 
Amendment had meant to prohibit all 
alcoholic liquors they would have said 
so. But on the contrary, the Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment plainly reads and 
provides for the prohibition alone of 
intoxicating liquors, not non-alcoholic 
liquors. Dr. Shields and others em¬ 
phasize, however, that the federal 
Government had, before the passage of 
the Volstead Act, fixed one half of one 
per cent as a standard, but they all fail 
to point out that that standard was 
clearly fixed in those days as the de- 
markation point for the purpose of 
revenue to the Government, not at all 
defining intoxicating or non-intoxicat¬ 
ing proportions. That standard was 
fixed, yes and agreed to by the brewers 


themselves, I do not doubt, as has so 
often been stated, because it marked 
the line as to when brewers did or did 
not pay a revenue to the Government. 
To attempt to advance this, which has 
so frequently been done, as a reason 
for this arbitrary maximum in the 
Volstead Act, which law is supposed to 
be dealing alone with the question of 
intoxicating liquors, is one of those 
deliberate bare-faced evasions which 
has greatly contributed to the uni¬ 
versal contempt shown for the law. 

The federal Government never taxed 
any liquor because it was intoxicating. 
For many years it has taxed spirits and 
fermented liquors, not because they 
were intoxicating, but because they 
were a convenient source of revenue. 
As a matter of fact, wine, which every 
one admits is more intoxicating than 
even the strongest of beers of old, was 
never taxed by the federal Government 
except when war made the need of 
money acute. Cider, which is more 
intoxicating than ordinary beer, is not 
taxed to this day. As stated, the 
adoption of the one half of one per cent 
standard was merely a standard of 
revenue. On June 29, 1904, a Treas¬ 
ury Decision, number 804 to be exact, 
was issued which said the question of 
whether fermented or malt liquor is 
intoxicating or non-intoxicating is im¬ 
material under the Internal Revenue 
Law. Again, Justice Day, speaking 
for the entire Supreme Court of the 
United States on January 5, 1920, in 
one of the liquor cases said: 

The fact that the Treasury Department 
may have declared taxable under many 
revenue acts all beer containing one half of 
one per cent of alcohol is not important. 
Such rulings did not turn upon the intoxi¬ 
cating character of the liquid, but upon 
classification for taxation controlled by 
other considerations. A liquid may be 
designated as beer and subjected to taxa¬ 
tion, although clearly non-intoxicating. 


76 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Give the States Opportunity 

Further, if the Volstead Act should 
be amended to permit of a 2.75 or 3.03 
by volume beer, there would be nothing 
in the world in such a regulation to 
prevent any state of the Union desiring 
to adhere to one half of one per cent as 
the maximum, to do so. If the officers 
of the Anti-Saloon League were sincere 
in the old days when they were so per¬ 
sistently advocating local option or 
home rule, why do they not now ad¬ 
vocate this federal leeway and if the 
twenty-odd states that now have state 
laws limiting beverages to one half of 
one per cent or less desire to continue 
that state limitation, no power in the 
federal Constitution can prevent it. 

At least permit the states which are 
convinced that the war-time beer as 
here defined is not intoxicating, which 
are convinced that the results of the 
tests that have been made are honest, 
which are convinced that it would bring 
about a better morale in the country, 
permit them, at least, to have the 
opportunity. This would not give one 
state any advantage over another, 
because I am contending, and contend¬ 
ing with all the emphasis at my com¬ 
mand, that the 3 per cent maximum 
would in every possible fair interpreta¬ 
tion be entirely within the limitations 
of the Constitution. 

Local Option in New Jersey 

I recall when I had the honor of 
being Governor of New Jersey, follow¬ 
ing a period of constant agitation for 
the enactment of a local option law. 
Many of those who have since been 
active in securing the adoption of the 
Eighteenth Amendment were then 
equally as active arguing for home rule. 
I believe thoroughly in home rule and 
without hesitation, following the pas¬ 
sage of the local option bill by the 
legislature, approved the act and thus 


gave New Jersey home rule on the 
liquor question. I am positive that a 
system of home rule today would much 
better solve the problems that we are 
facing. While, as I have frequently 
said, there can be no issue among real 
Americans as to the absolute necessity 
of compelling the enforcement of the 
law, there can be a fair and honest dif¬ 
ference of opinion as to what consti¬ 
tutes proper restraint on people’s 
liberty or rather what is a fair inter¬ 
pretation of constitutional require¬ 
ments. 

Our friend, Dr. Shields, is also 
quoted as having stated in a letter 
following the election last November 
as follows: “New Jersey in the next 
House of Representatives will have 
only three out of twelve votes that can 
be depended upon to defend the Vol¬ 
stead Act.” 

The Doctor has always, in the past, 
been a strong advocate of home rule. 
Then why should he not be influenced 
by the unmistakable verdict of the 
men and women of New Jersey, who, if 
his own assertion be correct, have 
elected at least nine out of twelve, 75 
per cent of the membership of the 
Lower House, the so-termed popular 
body? New Jersey is apparently con¬ 
vinced that the Volstead Act, at least 
in its present form, is a mistake. Ap¬ 
parently they have two Senators, 100 
per cent, who think likewise. 

It is asserted by medical men that 
there is as much alcohol generated in 
the system from a day’s ordinary diet 
as is contained in three pints of 3 per 
cent beer. As is well known, the 
capacity of an average stomach is less 
than three pints. How, then, as a 
matter of common sense, leaving 
science and medical tests aside, can it 
really be intoxicating? 

Apparently, Anti-Saloon League of¬ 
ficials do not consider it intoxicating. 
As stated time after time, through the 


“The Non-Effectiveness of the Volstead Act’* 


public hearings of three and a half years 
ago, appears the statement, “We are 
asking for one half of one per cent in 
order to accomplish the end in view.” 
In other words, that they were willing 
to set aside the Eighteenth Amendment 
in order to try to enforce the law. If 
the result of three and a half years’ 
experience had justified their October, 
1919, claims, I would not be here to¬ 
night making this appeal. But instead 
of lessening the desire for strong drink, 
it has had exactly the opposite effect. 

“What’s in a Name?” 

The word “beer” apparently shocks 
the sensibilities of some absolutely 
sincere opponents of remedial legisla¬ 
tion. When the word beer is used, 
their minds rather naturally go back to 
the old days of reeking barrooms and 
saloons. Perhaps if the non-intoxicat¬ 
ing beverage was called “sunshine” or 
“golden dew” very little, if any, com¬ 
plaint would be heard. When in this 
connection, as is authoritatively stated, 
alleged non-intoxicating beverages such 
as cider, root beer, fruit juices, and 
many patent medicines in general use, 
have a range of from \\ to 12 per cent 
and 15 per cent and even higher per¬ 
centages of alcohol, and are found in 
almost any home, is it not proof posi¬ 
tive that it is the word “beer” which 
antagonized rather than the contents 
or the effects thereof? Is it not worth 
while to make a united effort to over¬ 
come prejudice to a name, if by so 
doing we can make hundreds of thou¬ 
sands of protesting citizens better 
satisfied with the Government they 
live under and more responsive to our 
laws and our aspiration? 

Let’s Be Consistent 

I have heard suggestions made that 
I am not going far enough in an effort 
to improve the situation when I pro¬ 
pose the return of the war-time beer. 


11 

I will not deceive the people of New 
Jersey by either promising or holding 
out possibilities of extreme relief. 
Neither do I want to be understood as 
believing that even an amendment to 
the Volstead Act providing for a non¬ 
intoxicating 3 per cent beer can be 
enacted into law in the immediate 
future. It will require a nation¬ 
wide educational campaign forcing the 
truth and the facts home to the 
American people. 

Many members of Congress will, 
in private conversation, admit the 
justification of this relief—aye, and 
the wisdom of it—but they will not 
vote that way until they are positive 
in their own minds that they have 
home support. This is a pioneer 
movement and those who inaugurate 
it will be subjected to much misrepre¬ 
sentation and personal abuse. As I 
have stated, the latter seems to be the 
main weapon of attack on the part of 
the extreme adherents of prohibition. 
Therefore, progress may not be rapid, 
but, on the other hand, no progress 
will be made at all unless those in 
public position, who believe that relief 
must be secured, will come out of their 
shells and act publicly, as they talk 
and live privately. 

I am in total disagreement with the 
contention that legalizing 3 per cent 
beer would not greatly remedy the 
present deplorable situation. All must 
admit that the only possible relief 
from present drunkenness is to less¬ 
en the demand for strong drink 
which everyone knows is obtainable 
today in any city in the country. 
How are you ever going to accomplish 
that with Bevo? Conditions certainly 
can’t be worse if an effort at least to 
fill the gap is made by allowing 
constitutional beer. We will at least 
be honest with the Constitution. No 
one can really defend a policy that is 
predicted on the theory that it is 


78 


The Annals of the American Academy 


consistent to break all laws and 
trespass upon three constitutional 
amendments in order to try to enforce 
one law. That’s precisely the situa¬ 
tion presented by the Volstead Act 
today. 

To me, one of the most ridiculous 
arguments advanced against making 
the Volstead Act honest and having it 
comply with the Constitution, and 
cease detestable discrimination, is the 
contention that if the American people 
are given, for instance, 3 per cent beer, 
they will not appreciate the considera¬ 
tion, but will demand stronger bever¬ 
ages; that protests and law violations 
will go on just the same. 

Personally, I am convinced that an 
effort to meet the public demand rather 
than to continually police them will 
develop a much more tolerant spirit— 
but whether it does or does not, it is 
absolutely unjust and oppressive to 
pass laws admittedly more drastic 
than the Constitution itself. As long 
as the Volstead Act limits beverages to 
one half of one per cent just so long will 
the United States continue to be a nation 
of law breakers. As a matter of record, 
before prohibition went into effect 
there had been a steady decline in the 
use of ardent spirits and the substitu¬ 
tion therefor of beer. Progress was 
arrested by the enactment of the 
Volstead Act, and the almost total 
abolition of beer. In its place has 
come bootleggers’ hard liquor, with its 
attendant consequences all condoned 
by the extremists. 

Would the Saloon Return? 

Another contention frequently ad¬ 
vanced against making the Volstead 
Act honest is the fear of bringing back 
the saloon. How perfectly ridiculous! 
If 3 per cent beer is non-intoxicating 
and the Volstead Act so amended, 
then, of course, this beer could and 
would be sold just as Poland Water or 


bottled cider or grape juice or any 
other non-intoxicating beverages is 
distributed today. It is perfectly sim¬ 
ple to prohibit drinking in the grocery 
store or any other business house 
where it is dispensed. The common- 
sense result of permitting such a 
beverage would be the sale by case, 
which would permit those who desire 
it in their homes to have it, rather 
than the villainous, murderous home 
brew now dispensed in a majority of 
the modest homes in the land. Beer 
is legally sold in Sweden and Provinces 
in Canada, and, I am informed, saloons 
are not permitted in either country. 

It is interesting to note that the 
Swedish law likewise permits beverages 
containing not more than per cent 
of alcohol by weight, which is prac¬ 
tically 3 per cent of alcohol by volume, 
to be sold anywhere without licenses 
or without tax. Heavier beers and all 
wines are, on the other hand, taxed 
according to alcoholic contents and 
their sale is licensed. In other words, 
Swedish authorities have made 3 per 
cent as their dividing point on the 
assumption that beverages below that 
figure are non-intoxicating. 

A revised Volstead Act could very 
properly provide that beer could only 
be delivered from manufacturer to 
consumer. There are, of course, sa¬ 
loons now, and saloons galore so far as 
that’s concerned, in most of the cities 
of the country. From all we hear, 
they are dispensing all kinds of 
beverages, many illegally, of course. 
But to make an argument that the 
manufacture of non-intoxicating beer 
would bring back saloons, is a com¬ 
plete, absolute evasion of the present 
conditions and a contention without 
merit. 

From an Economic Viewpoint 

While I appreciate this question 
should not be greatly influenced by an 


“The Non-Effectiveness of the Volstead Act” 


79 


economic argument, at the same time, 
it is entirely consistent to argue by 
comparisons. Barron recently pub¬ 
lished a statement that in Great 
Britain the revenue in the year 1921 
from beer and spirits paid into the 
British Government was 194,441,104 
pounds sterling, which, by the way, is 
equal to the total income from all 
sources before the war. This revenue, 
in American money, would mean over 
$900,000,000, and when it is considered 
that the United States has more than 
double the population of Great Britain, 
on the same basis the income to this 
country for an equal consumption 
would have been over $2,000,000,000 
per year. I am further informed that 
two thirds of this income is derived 
from the tax on beer, which in the 
same proportion would mean an annual 
income to this country of $1,300,000,- 
000 from beer alone. When it is 
considered that Great Britain is the 
home of Scotch and Irish whiskies, and 
to realize that the character of drink¬ 
ing on the other side has, even with 
spirits legally accessible, been trans¬ 
formed from a nation of whisky- 
drinkers, the statement becomes doubly 
interesting. 

At the same time, there has been a 
decrease of 500 per cent in deaths 
from drunkenness and alcohol. How 
many lives could we save, now being 
sacrificed by alcoholic poisons, by 
thus practically doing away with home 
brew and family drunkenness, and 
staying the present startling national 
decay in America and in private 
morals. Reestablish the supremacy 
of law by the Government adhering to 
constitutional law. It is not alone 
the billion and a half we could collect 
as a tax on legal beer, but the indus¬ 
trial development as well that would 
be inspired by the great reduction in 
present onerous taxes thus made 
possible. However, I contend that 


this action is justified whether America 
collected one penny as a result thereof. 

Conditions in Great Britain and 
United States 

Great Britain has likewise since the 
war greatly modified her liquor priv¬ 
ileges. Public places are open only 
certain hours of the day. The alco¬ 
holic contents of hard liquor has been 
greatly reduced and as a result of this 
great reform, the situation is as stated. 

In this connection, and after this 
national experience, it was interesting 
to note only three days ago that the 
British House of Commons voted 
236 to 14, almost 17 to 1, against 
national prohibition. The main fea¬ 
ture of the debate was the condemna¬ 
tion of the workings of the American 
prohibition laws. 

Great Britain has been able to 
revise entirely her taxation system 
and has now a large balance in the 
Treasury. Do not attempt to meet 
this argument by any inferences or 
suggestions that Great Britain has 
lowered the standard or character of 
her citizenship, because of this com¬ 
mon-sense regulation. She has not 
paid that price for this big income. 
Decayed manhood and womanhood or 
mob violence against law and order 
has not resulted. Quite the contrary. 
I am sorry to be compelled to admit it, 
but there has been more unpunished 
crimes, more mob violence, more 
absolute defiance of law and order in 
our own country during recent years 
than the most minute examination of 
the records of Great Britain can 
possibly disclose. It was not always 
so. 

What a travesty on our national 
ideals; what a sorry outcome of our 
century and a half of existence as an 
independent nation, proclaiming to 
the world the discovery of the best 
possible method of providing liberty 


t 


I 


The Annals of the American Academy 


80 

under law, that we should now be 
pointed to as the law-breaking nation 
par excellence! 

Inconsistencies 

No fair-minded citizen can but 
marvel at the state of unrest and 
protest over efforts to enforce the 
Volstead Act when one reviews just 
a few of its inconsistencies and contra¬ 
dictions. For example, the Act, to¬ 
gether with subsequent interpretations 
on the part of Prohibition Department 
authorities, permits those who owned 
intoxicating liquors prior to prohibition 
days to transport them from one home 
to another. While very convenient 
for those who were wealthy enough to 
have early laid in a stock of liquors, 
which thousands did, still if the 
transportation privilege is constitu¬ 
tional, then the sale or manufacture of 
intoxicating liquors is likewise con¬ 
stitutional. The Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment prohibits all three, i.e., the sale, 
manufacture and transportation. By 
what arbitrary authority, then, is 
transportation of intoxicating liquors 
permitted by statute when the Con¬ 
stitution forbids? 

Of course, the answer is that so 
much liquor had been laid in when 
prohibition threatened, as has since 
been demonstrated by so-called “drys,” 
that those who inspired the Volstead 
Act were quite willing to wink at the 
Constitution in order to please liberal 
contributors. 

I well remember, during a recent 
campaign, meeting many factory em¬ 
ployees and industrial workers and 
endeavoring to speak to them on 
current topics. I was met by a chorus 
from the assembled multitude, “We 
want our beer.” “We want our 
beer.” And yet some of you are 
content to try to deceive yourselves by 
shouting adherence to the Volstead 
Act and one half of one per cent, while 


the rum runners and the Canadian 
specials bring hundreds of thousands 
of quarts of hard liquor, available to 
all who can afford the price. 

It is a national disgrace and the 
time has gone by to pass resolutions 
condemning legislators who insist on 
concrete relief. 

The Anti-Saloon League, together 
with the bootleggers, are making us a 
nation of poisonous hard liquor drink¬ 
ers; poisonous because there is no 
control over the stuff that is being 
disseminated; hard liquor drinkers be¬ 
cause a non-intoxicating beer is under 
the terms of the Volstead x4ct prohib¬ 
ited. 

We all know that many so-called 
“drys,” yes, in Congress and out, are, 
like the ostrich, hiding their heads in 
the sand and shouting, “I am dry.” 
How, under such circumstances, can 
we hope for real relief if we endorse 
such hypocrisy? 

As a matter of record, temperance 
was fast gaining a foothold and crime 
was slowly decreasing when this Act 
was thrust upon us. 

It has often been truly said that re¬ 
form usually comes when least needed. 

I understand Commissioner Haynes, 
Chief of the Prohibition Enforcement 
Bureau in Washington, following a 
trip across the continent, according 
to the public press, recently made the 
statement that his investigations had 
demonstrated “ a great decline in the use 
of liquor.” It is somewhat confusing 
to follow this reasoning when, accord¬ 
ing to the Prohibition Department’s 
own report issued this present month, 
arrests throughout the country the 
past six months of last year have in¬ 
creased over 25 per cent. 

In view of the fact that the appro¬ 
priations for enforcement have in¬ 
creased from $3,000,000 in 1919 to 
$9,000,000 in 1924, efforts to secure 
larger appropriations from Congress 


“The Non-Effectiveness of the Volstead Act” 


81 


for the purpose of more extensive 
•enforcement would seem most incon¬ 
sistent. In all good feeling, I am 
afraid the Commissioner has not been 
told the real existing facts. 

Speaking of expenses and enforce¬ 
ment, the Budget Officer of the 
Department of Justice testified before 
the Appropriations Committee at the 
last session of Congress that 44 per 
cent of all the time of the entire corps 
of District Attorneys was occupied 
with cases arising under the Volstead 
Act. This expense, of course, is en¬ 
tirely apart from the $9,000,000 ap¬ 
propriated for the use of the Prohi¬ 
bition Department. In sub-dividing 
the work by states, it was interesting 
to learn that in dry Southern Alabama, 
90 per cent of the time of the District 
Attorney was taken up with prohibi¬ 
tion matters, while even in dry Kansas, 
50 per cent; in dry Arizona, 65 per 
cent; in Arkansas, 50 per cent, and yet 
we are informed that the situation is 
improving throughout the country. 

Washington a Chief Offender 

Apparently the Commissioner could 
find a very fertile field for operation 
right in Washington, the city from 
which the enforcement department of 
the Government is administered. Ac¬ 
cording to the latest available informa¬ 
tion, Washington seems to be almost 
in the lead among offenders. Although 
Washington’s population, because of 
the closing down of war work, was 
reduced over 50,000 in 1921 and 1922 
as compared to 1920, still arrests for 
drunkenness increased 16 per cent 
in that time and those for infractions 
of prohibition laws more than 80 per 
cent. Of course, this might be an¬ 
swered by the contention that the 
increased number of infractions and 
arrests demonstrate the increased effi¬ 
ciency of the prohibition officials and 
police department, but we have been 
7 


proceeding upon the assumption that 
the statement of Commissioner Haynes 
that there had been a “great decline 
in the use of liquor” was correct. 

Likewise, a few days ago in the city 
of Washington, long lists of names of 
well-known citizens were published on 
the first page of a prominent newspaper 
as customers of an alleged bootlegger 
who had been apprehended by the 
authorities. I have failed to see 
any denials and I do not doubt that 
similar lists could be published in 
every state of the Union. 

Let it be clearly understood that by 
these references I do not intend to 
unduly criticize the Prohibition De¬ 
partment. I believe they are securing 
as good results as could anyone en¬ 
deavoring to administer an act, which 
in itself is a lie, and which I am very 
positive could not be made effective or 
near effective by any agency on earth. 
They are probably making the very 
best of a bad bargain. 

To enforce any law, especially one 
in which personal liberty is involved, it 
should be obvious that you must have 
a majority of citizens friendly to it. 
That was formerly the contention of 
the officers of the Anti-Saloon League 
when they were pressing for local op¬ 
tion or home rule. They no longer 
have any use for home rule. It served 
their purpose only as a curtain raiser. 

I will not contend that the possible 
remedy permitted by the limitations 
of the Eighteenth Amendment will 
entirely solve this great question. I 
am frankly afraid it will not. But I 
am equally convinced that it will 
greatly modify and alleviate the pres¬ 
ent intolerable conditions. 

How to Remedy 

My remedy is to give to such states 
as desire the right to permit a harmless 
beverage with a percentage of alcohol 
that can fairly be considered non-in- 


82 


The Annals of the American Academy 


toxicating. At the same time , put all 
the power of the Government back of real 
efforts to stop the importation of hard 
liquors. Inasmuch as we are not manu¬ 
facturing whiskies unless it be in isolated 
cases , I am convinced that the result of 
this policy would be to greatly improve 
conditions and , what is particularly 
important , serve to minimize the resist¬ 
ance which is now so universal. 

We shall never get prohibition by 
hounding small offenders. If the Gov¬ 
ernment really wants prohibition it 
must go after the barrels— the barrels of 
booze that roll into the United States every 
day and the barrels of graft that are paid 
for getting them in. 

Certainly the action of Congress in 
making the Volstead Act even more 
drastic has resulted in greater protest 
and violations. Isn’t it, then, almost 
time to take the American public into 
our confidence to the limit as per¬ 
mitted under the Constitution and see 
if they will not appreciate that every¬ 
thing possible under present conditions, 
at least, has been done to meet an 
exasperating situation? I have abso¬ 
lutely no patience with any lack 
of effort to bring these wholesale 
offenders, these smugglers and rum¬ 
runners to justice. But I am con¬ 
vinced that to successfully accom¬ 
plish this the present belligerent state 
of the public mind must be modified 
and I believe this would be the result 
of an effort along the lines here sug¬ 
gested. 

Time Has Shown 

No Senator or anyone else, for that 
matter, could have made this speech 
when the Volstead Act was adopted 
three and a half years ago, for the 
quite obvious reason that we lacked 
experience, were necessarily without 
facts, and the result of this unwar¬ 
ranted legislation could at that time 
only be speculation. Senators and 


Congressmen voted against the Act 
then from conviction that it was unfair • 
and would prove unworkable. I doubt 
if any of us could have pictured such a 
complete failure at enforcement as has 
resulted, with such country-wide scan¬ 
dals and with thousands of citizens 
from the highest to the lowest openly 
and fragrantly violating the law, 
accompanied by a widespread de¬ 
bauching of public officials. I venture 
to say that the vote would have been 
far different had Congress to go over 
it all again. 

Of course, it is a very difficult role 
to criticize what is supposed to be a 
moral reform. It is much easier to go 
along as it were and shut your eye to 
the facts. But I am convinced that 
the continued determination to force 
this unfair law down the throats of 
the American people is fomenting 
radicalism and law defiance in its 
worst form, and I am proud to be 
enlisted on the side of refusing to 
dodge or evade facts, simply because 
some paid agent of the Anti-Saloon 
League will endeavor to misrepresent 
my stand or make detestable references 
of saloon influences or other contempti¬ 
ble libels. 

I recognize the great difference 
between temperance and prohibition. 
The Volstead Act with its right to 
transport hard liquors was never in¬ 
tended to prohibit as far as the rich 
man was concerned. 

Well-meaning people who have been 
contributing thousands, yes millions, 
of dollars to the Anti-Saloon League, 
entirely actuated by a sincere desire to 
aid society and bring about a more 
temperate condition, have announced 
in many cases their withdrawal of 
support for the dual reason of alleged 
official misappropriation and a clear 
realization that the Volstead Act has 
proven a miserable failure and they 
will no longer support such a bluff. 


“The Non-Effectiveness of the Volstead Act” 


83 


How can we continue to fool our¬ 
selves and believe that the American 
people can be coerced or forced into an 
attitude of acquiescence or conciliation 
when they almost universally contend 
that their liberties are being torn from 
them and that the Constitution itself 
is in spirit, at least, being violated 
daily? 

If, upon further study and investi¬ 
gation, any better or more practical 
method to secure relief presents itself, 
I stand pledged to lend every aid to 
help bring about such an accomplish¬ 
ment. 

In the meantime, let’s write the 
Eighteenth Amendment into the Vol¬ 
stead Act and see if the American 
people will not appreciate this confi¬ 
dence and trust. 

Some Worthy Opinions 

Eminent authorities can be quoted 
on both sides of this question, but I 
have presented my argument gathered 
mainly from personal observation and 
study. However, following the pub¬ 
licity which this meeting has inspired, 
I have received hundreds of letters of 
suggestions and approval. I cannot 
refrain from quoting from just two, 
which in effect mirrors the opinions 
expressed in practically all of them. 
One reads as follows: “While approving 
of the Eighteenth Amendment, I re¬ 
gard its interpretation and application 
by the Volstead Act as un-American 
and as a vicious invasion of the re¬ 
served rights of the individual.” This 
opinion was expressed by that eminent 
divine, that enemy of vice, the Rev¬ 
erend C. H. Parkhurst of New York. 

Mr. Terrence V. Powderly, for 25 
years head of organized labor in this 
country, sends me this unsolicited 
viewpoint: 

For twenty-five years of service in the 
cause of labor, during the last half of the 
last century, I worked earnestly for temper¬ 


ance among my constituents, the working¬ 
men. During that time I saw them turn, 
by the thousand, away from strong drink 
and the saloon. 

Though I was, and am, a temperance 
man, I never did and do not now favor 
prohibition. Since the passage of the 
Eighteenth Amendment and the Volstead 
Act I have seen more of evil resulting from 
strong drink than I ever did before. Young 
people, who formerly would not think of 
drinking, now carry hip flasks, and drink at 
every social affair they attend. To do that 
a few years ago meant social ostracism. 

One argument used in support of the 
Volstead Act is that the next generation— 
having been reared under prohibition in¬ 
fluence—will know nothing about intem¬ 
perance. The facts appear to dispute that 
contention. I judge from what I see and 
hear among young people. 

In conclusion, I will quote from 
just one of the many public papers I 
have read on the subject. Dr. Stephen 
Leacock, Professor of Economics of 
McGill University, in a recent address, 
particularly attracted my attention 
because he selected as his title: “Based 
upon a Lie and Cannot Endure.” 
That has been my text this evening. 
He said among many other truisms: 

But the plain truth is that beer is just an 
ordinary beverage. You cannot make it 
criminal if you try. The attempt is silly. 
Common sense revolts at it. Some people 
like beer and some don’t. Some people 
find that it agrees with them and others do 
not. . . . The attempt to make the 

consumption of beer criminal is folly and 
futile. . . . 

I lay stress upon this word, criminal, 
because I think it needs to be stressed. I 
doubt whether the people realize that the 
Volstead Act and such like statutes are 
criminal laws. What they propose is vir¬ 
tually to send all people to jail who dare to 
drink beer, and to send them again and 
again for each new offense; to break them 
into compliance as people were once broken 
upon the wheel. 

The thing is monstrous. It is the most 



84 


The Annals of the American Academy 


brutal invasion of the province of liberty 
attempted within a century. It cannot 
succeed. It must fail as all tyranny has 
failed. But it is sad to think of the de¬ 
plorable havoc it is destined to make in its 
course; of the way in which it undermines 
the respect for the law; the way in which it 
breeds in every class of society a deep and 
bitter sense of injustice; of the way in which 
it breaks from the splendid traditions of 
freedom upon which, till this thing came, 
we had built up the commonwealth. . . . 

There is a spirit that you cannot break 
by the simple vote of a majority. The 
individual man, when he stands upon his 


plain right, will not down. His house is 
his castle and his life is his own. What 
service and obedience he owes to those in 
authority he renders as he should. But 
when authority passes into tyranny and 
law into oppression, then his obedience 
ends. He stands, if need be, alone and 
single-handed against the law, but behind 
him as his inspiration he has a thousand 
years of the tradition of individual liberty. 
There is a spirit in him that kings have 
never conquered, that parliaments have 
never compelled, that the scourge has never 
beaten out and that fire has never con¬ 
sumed. 


The Volstead Act 1 

By Hon. George S. Hobart 

Former Member of New Jersey Assembly 


T HE subject suggested by Mr. Edge 
for this discussion was: “The Non- 
effectiveness of the Volstead Act.” 
This law was passed by the federal 
Congress for the purpose of enforcing 
the provisions of the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment to the federal Constitution, which 
prohibits the manufacture, sale, trans¬ 
portation, importation or exportation 
of intoxicating liquor for beverage pur¬ 
poses. The Amendment was ratified 
by 46 of the 48 states and went into 
effect January 16, 1920. Under the 
terms of the Eighteenth Amendment 
the federal Congress and the several 
states were given power to enforce it by 
appropriate legislation. It has already 
been decided by the United States 
Supreme Court that the Volstead Act 
is appropriate within the meaning of 
the Amendment, and we, therefore, 
need not take time to consider that 
point. But in view of the subject 
suggested by Mr. Edge, the only ques¬ 
tion now before us is whether or not the 
Volstead Act has been or is effective. 
Let us therefore discuss the Act in the 
light of the saying: “By their fruits you 
shall know them.” 

Points of Agreement with Senator 

Edge 

It will serve to clear up the points of 
difference if I state my understanding 
of the points which I presume Senator 
Edge will concede. 

1. Will Mr. Edge deny that the 
Eighteenth Amendment was legally 
adopted as a part of the federal Con¬ 
stitution, in the same manner as 

1 Speech of Hon. George S. Hobart at a public 
discussion with Senator Walter E. Edge at 
Krueger Auditorium, Newark, N. J., April 24, 
1923. 


every other amendment, and, in all 
human probability, will continue to 
be a part of the Constitution as long 
as the Constitution itself stands? 

2. Will Mr. Edge deny that it was 
the duty of Congress and of the 
several states to pass appropriate 
legislation for the enforcement of 
the Amendment? 

3. Will Mr. Edge deny that the 
Volstead Act, in its present form, is 
appropriate legislation to enforce the 
Amendment? 

4. Will Mr. Edge deny that it is 
the duty of all officials, both federal 
and state, in accordance with their 
oath of office, to see that the Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment and the laws ap¬ 
propriate thereto are enforced? 

5. Will Mr. Edge deny that since 
the passage of the Eighteenth 
Amendment, the old-time saloon has, 
for the most part, disappeared, and 
will he concede that no good citizen 
desires its return? 

Points for Discussion 

I shall maintain, first, that the law, 
in its present form, is in fact effective; 
and, second, that there should not be 
any substantial modification thereof. 

I. The present law is effective. 

(a) Reasonable time should be 
allowed for a fair test. 

A little over three years have passed 
since national prohibition went into 
effect. It caused a violent wrench to 
the thoughts and habits of many citi¬ 
zens—especially those who have not 
kept pace with the progress of prohibi¬ 
tion. During this time it has had to 
carry the burdens of enslaved appetites 
and mortgaged souls, cast upon it 


85 


86 


The Annals of the American Academy 


through previous conditions. I quote, 
in this connection, from a speech by 
Mr. Cramton in the House of Repre¬ 
sentatives on February 24, 1923: 

The success or failure of prohibition will 
take time for its full exemplification. For 
every thousand years of the world’s re¬ 
corded experience with the curse of liquor, 
we should allow at least a year of experi¬ 
ence with prohibition. 

One striking fact stands out, which is 
beyond all question, even after this 
brief experience: namely, that the old- 
time saloon has gone forever. We find 
that even those who are most active in 
their opposition to the Eighteenth 
Amendment and the Volstead Act 
have taken as their slogan: “Beer and 
light wines now; the saloon, never.” 
The saloon may well say: “Nobody 
loves me any more.” 

I therefore submit that it is fair to 
ask that a reasonable time be given for 
a test of the law, for the purpose of 
determining whether it was wise or 
foolish for the nation to adopt this great 
experiment in the control of a business 
which had been officially recognized as 
a prolific source of crime, poverty and 
misery. 

(b) No law is perfectly enforced. 

If the prohibition law were perfectly 
enforced, it would be the outstanding 
legal miracle of the ages. Who can 
name any law to which perfect obedi¬ 
ence is given? For example, we read 
daily of illegal traffic in drugs, but no 
one suggests that the anti-narcotic 
laws should be repealed; on the con¬ 
trary, the suggestions made in regard 
to these laws are for the purpose of 
stricter enforcement. 

Again, no laws have ever been broken 
more frequently and by a greater num¬ 
ber of people than the laws which we 
find in the twentieth chapter of the 
Book of Exodus, but no one suggests 
that the Ten Commandments should 


be repealed—or even that they should 
be liberalized or modified. 

Examples might be multiplied, but 
the point may be summarized with the 
statement that the non-enforcement or 
the lax enforcement of a law is not in 
itself an argument either for the repeal 
of such law or for any weakening mod¬ 
ification thereof. Granting that the 
law is not perfectly enforced, that does 
not affect the question of whether it is 
effective; the real question is this: Is 

the laic effective if properly enforced? 

% 

(c) Violation of liquor laws is not a 
novelty. 

One would think, from the criticisms 
of the Volstead Act, that there never 
before had been any similar law and 
that there had never before been any 
violation of the laws regulating or pro¬ 
hibiting the liquor traffic. A precedent 
may be found for every provision of the 
Volstead Act in the laws of one or more 
of the states prior to the enactment of 
the Volstead Act; and, likewise, prece¬ 
dents may be found for every viola¬ 
tion of these provisions. Bootleggers, 
speak-easy’s and blind pigs are not new. 
They are as old as the liquor traffic 
itself. 

For example, in the state of New 
Jersey, the report of the Commissioner 
of Internal Revenue shows that of the 
11,431 liquor dealers in 1915 who paid 
the federal tax, there were 2,413 who 
paid the federal tax but had no license 
from the state. We can hardly assume 
that these 2,400 dealers paid a tax to 
the federal Government as a gift; they 
must have paid it in order to save them¬ 
selves from prosecution under the 
federal law; and yet, they had no state 
license to sell liquor. We therefore 
had at least 2,413 bootleggers in this 
state before the Volstead Act was 
passed. Does anyone seriously claim 
that in pre-prohibition days the 8,000 
liquor dealers of New Jersey obeyed the 


The Volstead Act 


87 


law, or that the officials fully enforced 
the laws? It is common knowledge 
that many, if not most, of these dealers 
kept open long after the hours limited 
by law, and likewise kept open seven 
days in the week; that many of 
them sold liquor without regard to 
the age of their customers; that many 
of the saloons were the breeding-places 
for many other violations of law. It 
may fairly be said that the repeated 
and almost continuous violation of law 
on the part of the liquor dealers was 
one of the strongest, if not the strongest 
influence in forcing upon the American 
people the conclusion that the only way 
to regulate the liquor traffic was to 
exterminate it. 

(d) The Volstead Act is in fact 
enforced. 

The records of the Attorney General 
of the United States from July, 1921, 
to the end of the year 1922, show that 
there were 27,301 convictions under 
the Volstead Act. The jail sentences 
amount to 2,045 years, 11 months and 
24 days, and the fines amount to 
$5,220,558.02. 

Even in New Jersey, convictions can 
be obtained for violation of the state 
liquor laws. If you do not believe it, 
then ask the one hundred defendants 
who were recently convicted in Atlantic 
County of violating the state law, 
which was 100 per cent of those who 
were tried. 

If the state laws in New York, or in 
New Jersey, for example, are not en¬ 
forced, that is no reflection on the 
federal law; on the contrary, it is a 
reflection upon the state officials, who, 
equally with federal officers, are sworn 
to enforce the law. If the several 
thousand policemen in the large cities 
of this state were as diligent in enforc¬ 
ing the prohibition law as the thirty 
federal officers, little more would be 
heard of the alleged failure to enforce 


the prohibition law in the state of 
New Jersey. 

(e) The effectiveness of the Vol¬ 
stead Act is demonstrated by the 
results that have been obtained even 
with imperfect enforcement. 

But it may be urged that the mere 
fact that a large number of convictions 
have been obtained under the Volstead 
Act does not prove that the law is 
“ effective ” in reducing the sale and use 
of intoxicating liquor. I grant that 
the number of convictions or the per¬ 
centage of convictions of violations is 
not the sole test of whether a law is 
effective. The fundamental question 
is whether the law accomplishes the 
purposes for which it was designed. 
Let us, therefore, consider some of the 
results that have followed the enact¬ 
ment of the Volstead Act. 

Massachusetts Survey 

The most complete comparison of 
“wet” and “dry” years in any state is 
found in what is known as the Massa¬ 
chusetts Survey—based upon the official 
records of that state. The comparison 
is between the two “dry ” years of 1920 
and 1921, and the seven “wet” years of 
1912 to 1918 (1919 being omitted as that 
was six months “w r et” and six months 
“ dry ”). Space will not permit to give 
the figures in detail, but some of them 
may be summarized as follows: 

In Boston, arrests for drunkenness 
decreased from an average for the 
seven “ wet ’’years of 59,308 to 26,393, 
for the two “dry” years, or about 
55 per cent. 

$ In the entire state of Massachu¬ 
setts average arrests for drunkenness 
decreased from 108,123 to 48,372, or 
a gain about 55 per cent. 

Arrests of women for all causes 
decreased in Boston from an average 
of 8,231 to 4,652, or 43 per cent, and 


88 


The Annals of the American Academy 


for drunkenness decreased from 4,743 
to 1,494, or 68 per cent. 

The deaths from alcoholism in 
Boston decreased from 134 to 50, or 
62 per cent; the number of deaths of 
women for the same cause decreased 
from 33 to 6, or 80 per cent. 

In the entire state, deaths from 
alcoholism decreased from 225 to 78, 
or 65 per cent. 

After the hard winter of 1921, the 
almshouses of the state had the 
smallest population in ten years. 

These figures are especially striking 
in view of the fact that Boston is re¬ 
garded as one of the “wettest” cities in 
the nation, and in view of the further 
fact that Massachusetts has no state 
enforcement law. It may therefore 
fairly be said that in Massachusetts, 
the Volstead Act has been “effective” 
in reducing crime, misery, poverty and 
death. 

New Jersey Survey 

A survey has recently been made of 
conditions in New Jersey showing a 
comparison of conditions for three 
years before and after prohibition be¬ 
came the law of the land. The fol¬ 
lowing is a summary: 

Charity 

(Charity cases caused by intemperance of 
wage earner.) 

Paterson— 

Total inebriate cases 


3 years before prohibition. 233 

3 years since prohibition. 18 

Decrease, 92%, or. 215 


Relief expenditures in last two years 


decreased $3,649.10. 

Atlantic City— 

3 years before prohibition. 175 

3 years since prohibition. 48 

Decrease, 72.77%, or . 127 


Newark— 

3 years before prohibition. 108 

3 years since prohibition. 29 


Decrease, 73.1%, or. 79 


Vital Statistics 

Decrease in deaths in three years since pro¬ 
hibition with three years before pro¬ 
hibition in whole state: 

Alcoholism, decrease. 50.8% 

Cirrhosis of liver, decrease.... 29.2% 

The latter is distinctly an alcoholic 
disease. 

Education 

Absences from school because of poverty 
(lack of sufficient clothing). 

Three years since prohibition compared 
with three years before prohibition: 


Newark, decrease. 40.6% 

Paterson, decrease. 31 % 


Working papers granted minors. 

Three years since vs. three years before 


prohibition: 

Newark, decrease. 34.1% 

Paterson, decrease. 28.2% 

Jersey City, decrease. 29 % 


State Institutions 

The report of the state institutions shows 
that on the basis of an average cost of $500 
for each commitment, there has been a 
saving to the state by reason of the decrease 
in commitments since the Volstead Act 


was passed of $211,500. 

Insanity 
Alcoholic Insanity Cases— 

Morris Plains 

3 years before prohibition. 66 

3 years since prohibition. 26 

Decrease, 60.6%, or. 40 

Trenton Hospital 

3 years before prohibition. 202 

3 years since prohibition. 84 

Decrease, 58.4%, or. 118 


The report of the Essex County 
Hospital at Overbrook is of special 




























The Volstead Act 


89 


interest. In 1916 there were 46 cases 
admitted of alcoholic psychosis, or 12.6 
of the total admissions. In 1921 the 
number of such cases 1.1 per cent of 
the total admissions, and in 1922 the 
number 2.3 per cent of the total. The 
total number for the three years next 
before prohibition was 78, and the total 
for the three years since prohibition 
was 21. 

The records of the police depart¬ 
ments in some of the cities of New 
Jersey are also of interest in this con¬ 
nection, as follows: 

Police Department Records 
1917-1918-1919 vs. 1920-1921-1922 


Arrests for drunkenness: 

Newark, decreased. 26.6% 

Trenton, decreased. 29.1% 

Paterson, decreased. 24.1% 

Jersey City, increased. 14.8% 

Disorderly conduct:* 

Newark (*See below.) 

Trenton, decreased. 32.1% 

Paterson, decreased.42.1% 

Jersey City, decreased. 24.4% 

Vagrancy and begging: 

Newark, decreased. 13.1% 

Trenton, decreased. .. 23.5% 

Paterson, decreased. 94.3% 


Jersey City, unchanged. 

*Methods of classification so changed 
under different administrations as to make 
comparison infeasible. 

Another interesting set of figures 
shows the financial resources of the 
state of New Jersey at the end of the 
year 1922, as compared with the end of 
1917. The comparison of the two 
years is as follows: 

30 more state banks and trust com¬ 
panies. 

431 more building and loan associa¬ 
tions. 

357,572 more building and loan association 
members. 

40,917 more depositors in savings banks. 


Resources (state and savings banks, build¬ 
ing and loan associations and trust 
companies): 

End of 1922. $1,359,294,572.00 

End of 1917. 705,725,528.00 

Increase in five years $653,569,044.00 
Or 92.5% 

Of course, no one claims that this 
tremendous increase is due entirely to 
prohibition; but it is pretty conclusive 
that the business of the state has not 
been unfavorably affected by the ad¬ 
vent of prohibition. We were warned 
that prohibition would disturb business 
and that it would ruin certain lines of 
business. But the records show that 
the only lines of business that have been 
unfavorably affected by prohibition 
are the undertakers, the grave diggers 
and the monument makers. 

(f) Vital statistics. 

It is sometimes stated that prohibi¬ 
tion is responsible for the death of and 
injury to persons caused by the drink¬ 
ing of wood alcohol. There have been 
some cases of death and injury from 
this cause, but why blame the prohibi¬ 
tion law? One might as well blame 
the anti-narcotic law for death caused 
by an overdose of morphine. These 
results flow, not from the law, but from 
the greed of the lawbreaker and the 
appetite of his victim. In any event 
it is highly improbable that any person 
who drinks wood alcohol by mistake 
for whisky would be satisfied with 3 
per cent or any other kind of beer. 
What such a drinker demands is a 
liquor with a powerful “kick” to it. 

But after allowing for the deaths 
from wood alcohol, the official records 
show a startling decrease in the num¬ 
ber of deaths resulting from the use of 
all kinds of alcohol. If we take the 
registration area (this covers 34 states, 
the District of Columbia, and 16 states 
in non-registration area, with a total 















90 


The Annals of the American Academy 


population on July 1, 1921, of about 
88,000,000), the records show that the 
rate of deaths from alcoholism de¬ 
creased from 5.4 persons per 100,000 in 
the year 1910 to 1.8 per 100,000 in the 
year 1921. 

Take the city of New York—the 
average number of deaths from alco¬ 
holism in 1916 and 1917 was 623; and 
in 1920 and 1921 it was 108. Taking 
the same years for fourteen cities, in¬ 
cluding such “wet” centers as Chicago, 
Detroit, St. Louis, Cincinnati, and 
Milwaukee, the average number of 
deaths from alcoholism for the “wet” 
years was 124, and for the “dry” years 
was 26. 

The death rate for all causes per one 
thousand of population in the registra¬ 
tion area has decreased from 15.0 in 
1910 to 11.6 in 1921—the lowest ever 
known. 

Other figures and other illustrations 
might be multiplied, but enough has 
been said to show that prohibition has 
not hurt business, but, on the contrary, 
has increased our financial resources 
and has had a large share in reducing 
poverty, crime, misery and death. 

(g) Summary. 

The facts may be summarized in a 
letter from Dr. Charles W. Eliot, 
president emeritus of Harvard Uni¬ 
versity, written under date of Febru¬ 
ary 12, 1922: 

Evidence has accumulated on every 
hand that prohibition has promoted public 
health, public happiness, and industrial 
efficiency. This evidence comes from 
manufacturers, physicians, nurses of all 
sorts, school, factory, hospital, and district, 
and from social workers of many races and 
religions laboring daily in a great variety of 
fields. This testimony also demonstrates 
beyond a doubt that prohibition is sapping 
the terrible force of disease, poverty, crime 
and vice. These results are obtained in 
spite of imperfect enforcement in some com¬ 
munities of the Eighteenth Amendment. 


I therefore challenge the statement 
that the Volstead Act has not been 
effective; and, on the contrary, assert 
that according to the testimony of 
social workers, police officers, hospital 
records and death statistics, the Vol¬ 
stead Act has been effective to reduce 
misery and to increase happiness; to 
reduce crime and to increase obedience 
to the law; to decrease poverty and to 
increase financial independence; to 
decrease the chances of death and to 
increase the chances of longevity. 

I challenge those who oppose pro¬ 
hibition or who favor a modification of 
the existing law to point to any other 
law of which these things may be 
truthfully asserted. 

If, nevertheless, it be argued that the 
law is not properly enforced, then I 
answer that the fault is not with the 
law, but with those who are sworn to 
uphold it. 

If it be said that the present condi¬ 
tions with respect to law enforcement 
are dangerous and intolerable, I an¬ 
swer: First, that the official records do 
not justify such statement; second, 
that if conditions are as bad as repre¬ 
sented, it is the duty of every official 
and of every law-abiding citizen to see 
that such conditions are changed; and 
if it be said that it is impossible to 
change the conditions, I answer that I 
refuse to believe that the government 
of the United States and of the several 
states is so weak that, criminals are 
superior to it; in the language of Gover¬ 
nor Pinchot of Pennsylvania: “I believe 
that this Commonwealth is greater and 
more powerful than any band of law¬ 
breakers whatsoever.” 

II. There should not be any substan¬ 
tial modification of the Volstead Act. 

(a) The Eighteenth Amendment 
itself cannot be repealed. 

In discussing this point, I take it for 
granted that those who desire to mod- 


The Volstead Act 


91 


ify the law still desire to have it effec¬ 
tively enforced. 

There is no possibility of obtaining a 
two-thirds majority in both houses of 
Congress for submitting to the several 
states an amendment to repeal or 
modify the Eighteenth Amendment; 
and there would be no possibility of 
obtaining a three-fourths majority of 
the several states for the adoption of 
such amendment, if submitted. Any 
proposed modification of the Volstead 
Act must conform to the Eighteenth 
Amendment as it stands, or such law 
would be nothing more than a mere 
gesture. 

(b) Burden of proof is on those who 
propose changes. 

The question therefore narrows itself 
to this: What modification, if any, 
should there be of the Volstead Act 
within the limitations of the Eighteenth 
Amendment? In discussing this ques¬ 
tion I have not had the advantage of 
knowing definitely in advance what 
the proposed change is; and under the 
terms of this discussion I shall not have 
an opportunity at this time to answer 
what is proposed. I submit, however, 
that in view of what the records show 
as to the results of prohibition as en¬ 
forced by the provisions of the Vol¬ 
stead Act, the burden of proof is upon 
those who suggest a modification 
thereof. It will not do to say that 
because the Volstead Act is not per¬ 
fectly enforced, that therefore it should 
be changed; as the same argument 
would apply with equal force to any 
other law. Neither will it do to make 
general statements about poor enforce¬ 
ment, or lax enforcement. We must 
look at the official records. Neither 
will it do to charge upon the law itself 
the failure to enforce it on the part of 
those whose duty it is to enforce it. 
Any criticism in that regard should be 
directed at the officials rather than at 


the law. It will not do to sit idly by 
and permit our public officials to wink 
at violations of the law and then at¬ 
tempt to excuse them by saying that 
the law cannot be enforced. The 
records show that it can be enforced when 
an honest attempt is made to do so. 

(c) The specific objection to the 
Volstead Act. 

The chief criticism of the present 
law is its definition of the term “intoxi¬ 
cating liquor.” Those whose slogan is 
“back to the Constitution” argue that 
the law defines as intoxicating, bever¬ 
ages which in fact are not intoxicating, 
and they propose a modification of the 
law so as to permit the manufacture 
and sale of beverages which they assert 
are not in fact intoxicating. To be 
more specific, the present campaign is 
apparently intended to bring about a 
change in the definition of intoxicating 
liquor so as to permit the manufacture 
and sale of “light wines and beer.” 

(d) Is buttermilk intoxicating? 

Those who favor this change illus¬ 
trate their argument with the assertion 
that the ordinary buttermilk which 
may be purchased in any drug store 
contains a percentage of alcohol which 
is greater than that permitted by the 
Volstead Act, namely, from 3 to 5 per 
cent of alcohol, and they ask whether 
we should arrest people for drinking 
buttermilk. There seems to be a con¬ 
centrated drive on the buttermilk 
argument at this time, as I have seen it 
mentioned in the reports of the remarks 
of all the distinguished gentlemen who 
favor a modification of the Volstead 
Act. It may therefore be in order to 
say something about buttermilk before 
taking up the question of light wines 
and beer. 

In the first place, I challenge the 
assertion that the ordinary buttermilk 
contains more than one half of one per 


92 


The Annals of the American Academy 


cent of alcohol. That kind of butter¬ 
milk, if there is any, must be produced 
from some special brand of cows—it 
certainly does not come from the 
ordinary Jersey cow. 

If the “wets” had a cow that gave such 
milk, 

They’d dress her in the finest silk, 

They’d feed her on the choicest hay, 

And milk her forty times a day. 

I do not know what brand of butter¬ 
milk is sold in Washington, or in 
Trenton, or in Paterson, but so far as 
the city of Newark is concerned, a 
recent analysis of buttermilk purchased 
at the Firemen’s Pharmacy, corner of 
Broad and Market Streets, shows that 
such buttermilk does not contain 
alcohol. The report of the chemist of 
the New York office of the Bureau of 
Internal Revenue, under date of March 
27, 1923, shows that the sample of 
buttermilk submitted to him contains 
no alcohol. This analysis was made of 
one pint of buttermilk purchased for 
twenty cents. When I received the 
report of this analysis, it occurred to 
me that possibly this particular sample 
was what might be called “near butter¬ 
milk,” and to avoid any misunder¬ 
standing I asked Dr. Edel, who is 
recognized as the leading chemical 
expert in this city, to analyze samples 
of buttermilk. He reports that he 
examined four specimens, as follows: 

1. One sample of “old-fashioned” 
buttermilk, purchased at Petty’s 
Drug Store. 

2. One sample of “old-fashioned” 
buttermilk taken from the creamery 
of Newark Milk and Cream Co. 

3. One sample of cultured sour 
milk called “ Al-der-lac.” 

4. Sample of buttermilk churned 
in the city laboratory from fresh raw 
milk. 

He reports that he found no alcohol 
in the first three samples. He exposed 


the fourth sample to the air for six days 
and reports that that sample obtained 
some yeast cells from the air and, on 
analysis it showed, at the end of six 
days, one hundredth of one per cent of 
alcohol by weight. At this rate, a 
glass of buttermilk, if exposed to the 
air, will accumulate 5 per cent of 
alcohol in three thousand days, or 
nearly ten years. 

Those who drink buttermilk as their 
favorite “tipple” may therefore con¬ 
tinue to do so with a perfectly clear 
conscience, so far as the Volstead Act 
is concerned. 

I think it may fairly be said that Mr. 
Volstead has no objection to the manu¬ 
facture or sale of the ordinary butter¬ 
milk. It may be possible to add to 
such buttermilk certain ingredients 
which, when fermented, in time would 
produce a certain degree of alcoholic 
content. But it is equally possible to 
do that with any other kind of bever¬ 
age, even pure spring water. We 
should cease to slander buttermilk, and 
the cows of New Jersey. The pure 
juice of the cow will never intoxicate. 

(e) Light wines. 

But what shall be said of the so- 
called light wines? We need not take 
much time on this part of the discus¬ 
sion. No wine has ever been invented 
—no matter how “light”—which con¬ 
tains less than 8 per cent of alcohol. 
When the percentage of alcohol falls 
under that figure, the beverage is no 
longer wine, but turns into vinegar, and 
I have yet to hear of anyone who wants 
to change the Volstead Act so as to 
permit the use of vinegar as a beverage! 
No expert has ever had the hardihood 
to claim that a beverage with 8 per 
cent of alcohol is not intoxicating, and 
all the argument about light wines 
may be dismissed with the statement 
that Congress does not have the con¬ 
stitutional power to permit the sale of 


The Volstead Act 


93 


light wines, as any such permission 
would be a direct violation of the 
Eighteenth Amendment. 

(f) Three per cent beer. 

Having disposed of buttermilk and 
wines, we still have beer left for con¬ 
sideration. The beer keg now stands 
by itself without the companions with 
which it has been accustomed to con¬ 
sort for many years. With a haughty 
wave of the hand, the beer keg now says k 
to the whisky barrel and the wine 
bottle, and its other associates in crime 
and misery, “Stand by thyself; come 
not near to me, for I am holier than 
thou.” (See Isaiah, 65-5.) 

I understand that the specific pro¬ 
posal of Mr. Edge is that the law be 
changed by permitting the manu¬ 
facture and sale of beer containing not 
more than 2.75 per cent of alcohol by 
weight—commonly described as 3 per 
cent beer. Let us therefore consider 
for a few minutes the question of 
whether a change in the Volstead Act 
permitting the manufacture and sale 
of 3 per cent beer would tend to make 
the law more effective. Note, that the 
answer to the question does not depend 
upon whether or not 3 per cent beer is 
in fact intoxicating, but whether the 
Volstead Act would be more effective 
if the definition therein of intoxicating 
liquor were changed so as to permit the 
sale of that kind of beer. 

i. Three per cent beer is in fact 
intoxicating. 

The first answer to the question is 
that such a modification would be held 
to be a violation of the Eighteenth 
Amendment if the court should con¬ 
clude that such a beverage was in fact 
intoxicating. On this point there is a 
very respectable body of opinion that 
beer containing 2.75 per cent of alcohol 
by weight is in fact intoxicating. The 
subject was exhaustively considered in 


the war-time prohibition cases and was 
also considered at length by the Judi¬ 
ciary Committee of the United States 
Senate in several hearings that were 
conducted before the passage of the 
Volstead Act. 

The following scientists have made 
affidavits that 2.75 by weight (or 3.4 by 
volume) beer is intoxicating: 

Dr. Harvey W. Wiley, former chief 
chemist of the U. S. Department of 
Agriculture. 

Dr. Howard A. Kelly of Johns- 
Hopkins University, Baltimore. 

Dr. Arthur D. Bevan, president of 
the American Medical Association. 

Dr. W. A. Evans, formerly commis¬ 
sioner of health of Chicago and now 
professor in Northwestern University 
Medical School. 

Professor Geo. O. Higley, professor 
of chemistry in Ohio Wesleyan Uni¬ 
versity. 

Mr. Henry Carter, member of the 
Central Board of Great Britain. 

Dr. Reid Hunt, professor in the 
medical school of Harvard University. 

Mr. Robert R. S. Hammond, assist¬ 
ant to the attorney general of the 
commonwealth of Australia. 

Professor William Geagley, assistant 
analyst of the Food and Drug Depart¬ 
ment for the state of Michigan. 

Professor Abel R. Todd, state ana¬ 
lyst for the state of Michigan. 

Dr. Edward M. Frankel, professor in 
Columbia University, New York City. 

Dr. Charles E. Nammack, surgeon 
of police of the city of New York. 

Dr. Kelly says: 

I consider no beer safe above one-half per 
cent of alcohol by volume, which would 
mean about three fourths of a teaspoonful 
of alcohol to an ordinary bottle of beer. 

Dr. Bevan says: 

There can be absolutely no doubt but 
that beer containing 2f per cent alcohol is 
an intoxicating beverage in that an indi- 


94 


The Annals of the American Academy 


vidual can become drunk on the amount 
that is frequently consumed. 

Professor Higley says: 

That the drinking of beer containing 3 
per cent of alcohol by volume often results 
in hilarious outbursts followed by surly 
behavior. 

That in the stage of this excitation often 
termed the “jolly” condition, the drinker 
loses his self-control and often his self- 
respect, his actions becoming careless and 
even immoral. 

Dr. Hunt says: 

If by the term “intoxicating liquor” is 
meant a liquor which contains sufficient 
alcohol to cause, when the liquor is taken 
in amounts which are not unusually taken 
by men, distinct effects upon the nervous 
system, the effects being characteristic of 
and due to the contained alcohol, I am of 
the opinion that beer containing 2.75 per 
cent by weight of alcohol should be classed 
as an intoxicating beverage. 

Mr. Hammond says: 

Liquors containing 1| per cent of alcohol 
or more, considered intoxicating liquors in 
Australia under the law, while those below 
that standard are classed as non-intoxicating 
liquors. At least one half of those arrested 
for intoxication were intoxicated on beer. 

Professor Frankel says: 

I am therefore of the opinion, as a result 
of my review of the writings of the above 
investigators, that the beginning of intox¬ 
ication effects is possible after the consump¬ 
tion of beer containing 2.75 per cent by 
weight of alcohol, when quantities such as 
are ordinarily consumed are taken. 

Dr. Nammack says: 

Based upon my studies, abundant op¬ 
portunities for professional experience, and 
personal test of the product, I am of the 
opinion that beer containing 2.75 per. cent 
of alcohol is an intoxicating beverage. 

A letter dated April 7, 1923, from 
Dr. Wiley, on this subject, says: 

An alcoholic content of 2.75 per cent by 
weight is equivalent to 3.45 per cent by 
volume. There is no question in the mind 


of any informed person in regard to the 
toxicity of such a beer. It may not and 
does not produce violent intoxication in 
most persons, but it does produce intoxica¬ 
tion in every person. 

The present limit on alcoholic content in 
the Volstead Act is the only safe one to 
adopt if we propose to obey the limitations 
fixed by the Eighteenth Amendment. 

After reading the views of these 
gentlemen of learning and experience, 
I venture to make a parody on a jingle 
that is familiar to all of us: 

Little Jack Horner 
Sat in the corner, 

Tasting some three per cent beer. 

He blew off the foam 
And put the drink home, 

And said: “Wow! The old kick is still- 
here.” 

The truth of the matter is that 3 per 
cent beer would have the same old 
kick. If it does not, those who want 
to drink it will be woefully disap¬ 
pointed, and those who have relied on 
the promises of certain politicians will 
demand an explanation, and they will 
want their money back. 

2 . Division of opinion. 

But it may be claimed that there are 
other eminent authorities who are of 
opinion that 3 per cent beer is not in 
fact intoxicating. Let us grant for the 
moment that there may be a division 
of opinion among experts. The very 
fact of such division of opinion would 
make the law more difficult of enforce¬ 
ment. Experts would have to be 
called on both sides and the average 
jury might have great difficulty in any 
particular case in deciding whether 3 
per cent beer was in fact intoxicating. 
Even if the jury sampled the beer 
themselves, they would have difficulty 
in reaching a conclusion, as the experts 
agree on one point,—namely, that such 
beer has a different effect on different 
individuals; thus, it might have a 


The Volstead Act 


95 


visibly intoxicating effect on one per¬ 
son, and yet have little, if any effect, 
upon one accustomed to its use. The 
only safe course, under such circum¬ 
stances, is to take a percentage of 
alcohol which, admittedly, would not 
cause intoxication in any person. This 
would avoid the important, and as yet 
unanswered question—when is a man 
drunk? Our own Court of Appeals 
has attempted to answer the question, 
and I quote from the opinion in the 
Rodgers case: 

The expression “under the influence of 
intoxicating liquor” covers not only all the 
well-known and easily recognized condi¬ 
tions and degrees of intoxication, but any 
abnormal mental or physical condition 
which is the result of indulging in any 
degree in intoxicating liquors and which 
tends to deprive him of that clearness of 
intellect and control of himself which he 
would otherwise possess. 

I am told that a recent test has been 
discovered in Washington which can be 
used only when the moon is at the full. 
It is said that if a man sees only one 
moon he has been drinking less than 
one half of one per cent; if he sees two 
moons he has been drinking more than 
one half of one per cent; and if he sees 
no moon at all, he has been drinking 
wood alcohol! 

Of course the practical question in 
the consideration of the subject is— 
how can the law be made most effec¬ 
tive? If we take some certain and 
definite test which is generally ap¬ 
proved by experience, then the ques¬ 
tion is, does the particular beverage fall 
above or below that test; and that 
question can readily be answered 
without throwing upon the courts the 
burden of defining or deciding what is 
meant by intoxication. 

On the other hand, if we approve 3 
per cent beer, or some other beverage 
whose intoxicating nature may be said 
to be debatable, then the only practical 


way to enforce such a law would be to 
station a chemist at one end of the bar 
to analyze the beer before it is sold, in 
order to make sure that it is within the 
legal limit, and to station a physician 
at the other end to examine the cus¬ 
tomer, in order to determine whether or 
not he is susceptible to that grade of 
beer to such an extent as to become 
intoxicated by drinking it. 

The test of an intoxicating liquor is 
whether it in fact intoxicates. The 
degree of intoxication is immaterial. 
To quote from Dr. Wiley: 

Visible intoxication is not essential to 
intoxication. The sun is totally eclipsed 
even if we do not see the shadow of the 
moon. When a person gets drunk, the first 
glass he drinks is just as much responsible 
for his condition as the last one. Intoxica¬ 
tion has a beginning and that beginning is 
as much intoxication as the final death 
struggle of the man who dies from alcoholic 
intoxication. Every step is essential to 
the whole journey. The man who doesn’t 
take the first step doesn’t die of the last one. 

The fact of the matter is that the 
law cannot be effectively enforced 
unless some definite standard is fixed; 
and that standard, under the decisions, 
can be fixed without reference to 
whether the particular liquor is or is 
not intoxicating. This question was 
fully considered and decided in the 
case of Ruppert vs. Cajjey , in which the 
United States Supreme Court held 
that it is deemed impossible to effec¬ 
tively enforce either prohibitory or 
regulatory laws relating to intoxicating 
liquor, unless the law itself fixes a 
definite standard by reference to the 
percentage of alcohol; in other words, 
that the law itself must fix the definition , 
if it is to be capable of effective enforce¬ 
ment. 

3. Present beer is said to be as 
good as ever. 

But why should there be any change 
in the alcoholic content of the beer that 


96 


The Annals of the American Academy 


is now made? If a change to 3 per 
cent beer would be likely to cause 
intoxication, then it would be useless 
to make such a law; on the other hand, 
if the present beer is just as good as it 
ever was, why take the chance of 
authorizing a beer which the courts 
might declare to be illegal? Is the 
beer that is now made as good as ever? 
The answer is found in the public 
statements of those who make it. 

Let us start right here. I quote 
from Krueger’s advertisement: 

“Krueger’s Special” is brewed and aged 
and fermented in the famous Krueger way, 
to give it all the old-time tang, snap and 
incomparable flavor. 

A wholesome brew from high-grade malt 
and hops. 

Feigenspan’s Private Seal advertise¬ 
ment reads: 

Private Seal, as mellow and tasty as ever, 
is still at your service. Tests have shown 
that its taste and body-building qualities 
remain unchanged. 

It is as good as ever. 

Budweiser: 

For fifty years, 

Same old process, 

Same old flavor. 

Same old value. 

If these beers are just as good as 
ever and if they have the same old 
flavor and all the other alleged advan¬ 
tages of the old-fashioned beer—minus 
only the alcohol, why the agitation for 
a change? 

4. The origin of one half of one per 
cent as the definition of intoxicating 
liquor. 

There is nothing new about the 
definition that intoxicating liquor is 
any beverage which contains one half 
of one per cent of alcohol by volume or 
more. For at least twenty years this 
very definition has been in effect in 
construing the provisions of the inter¬ 


nal revenue statutes for taxation of 
intoxicating liquor. (See Treasury de¬ 
cision 514 in the year 1902.) 

Before the passage of the Volstead 
Act, the same question was considered 
by many of the states, as pointed out 
in the decision above mentioned. At 
the time the Volstead Act was passed, 
sixteen states made any beverage un¬ 
lawful which contained any trace of 
alcohol; in eighteen states, the test was 
one half of one per cent; in six states 
the test was one per cent and in two 
states, the test was 2 per cent. Only 
one state (Rhode Island) had adopted 
a test as high as 2.75 per cent by weight. 
Since, therefore, thirty-four states had 
already adopted a limit of one half of 
one per cent or less, it was entirely 
appropriate and natural for Congress 
to adopt the standard which the 
experience of so many states had 
shown to be necessary for effective 
enforcement of liquor laws. 

Since the decision of that case in 
January, 1920, New Jersey has adopted 
the test of one half of one per cent in 
its enforcement law T of 1922; and only a 
few r w r eeks ago, Pennsylvania adopted 
the same standard as that fixed by the 
Volstead Act. Even Rhode Island has 
fallen in line with a similar standard. 

5. Conflict between 3 per cent beer 
and state laws. 

As the record now stands, there are 
forty-four states which, by statute, 
have adopted a test of one half of one 
per cent or less. 

If a 3 per cent bill were passed by 
Congress, it wxrnld therefore be in 
direct conflict with the statutory pro¬ 
visions of most of the states. 

6. Referendums in various states. 

If 3 per cent beer is the wonderful 
blessing which some people maintain, 
if it is so certain to increase respect for 
law T and order, if it is bound to stop the 


The Volstead Act 


97 


present tendency to disregard the Con¬ 
stitution, it would seem as if these facts 
would have been discovered during the 
many years that the question was under 
discussion. It happens that the sub¬ 
ject has been a football in the political 
arena of several other states. What 
happened? 

Colorado 

Adopted prohibition in 1914 by a 
majority of 11,000; defeated a beer 
amendment in 1916 by a vote of 85,000; 
and followed it with a bone dry law in 
1918 by a majority of 40,000. 

Michigan 

Adopted prohibition in 1916 by a 
majority of 68,000. On April 7, 1919, 
a beer and wine amendment was sub¬ 
mitted and was defeated by a majority 
of about 208,000. 

Ohio 

Adopted prohibition in 1918 by a 
majority of 25,000. In 1919 defeated 
an amendment providing for 2.75 per 
cent beer by a majority of 29,000. In 
1920 approved an enforcement law by 
a majority of 290,000, which law pro¬ 
vides for a limit of one half of one per 
cent. In 1922 defeated a proposal to 
permit light wines and beer by a major¬ 
ity of 209,000. 

Oregon 

In 1914 adopted prohibition by a 
majority of 36,000. In 1916 defeated 
a beer amendment by a majority of 
54,000. 

W ashington 

In 1914 adopted prohibition by a 
majority of 18,000. In 1916 defeated 
a beer amendment by a majority of 
147,000. 

* 7. Experiences of other states with 
beer. 

Of course, it may be said that the 
voters in the several states just men¬ 


tioned, which have overwhelmingly 
rejected proposals for the use of beer, 
were all mistaken and did not know 
what they were voting for. It is, how¬ 
ever, a remarkable coincidence that 
whenever the question has been 
squarely presented for decision of the 
voters, the result has always been the 
same. It is hardly possible that so 
many of the American people could be 
fooled all the time. But however that 
may be, let us now go a step farther 
and examine the results in certain com¬ 
munities that were foolish enough to 
make the test of permitting the sale of 
beer on the theory that it would tend 
to promote temperance and sobriety. 

The test has been made in the states 
of Georgia and Massachusetts and, 
more recently, in the territory of 
Hawaii. 

In Massachusetts, the so-called pro¬ 
hibition law of 1869 (effective in 1870) 
permitted the sale of malt liquors con¬ 
taining about 3 per cent of alcohol. 
After a short test, the law was repealed. 
The results of the “prohibition” law 
which permitted the manufacture and 
sale of beer were stated as follows by 
Judge Rockwell of the Berkshire 
District Court: 

Under the laws of 1870, the sale of malt 
liquor was authorized for several months in 
the town by vote of the inhabitants. Ef¬ 
forts to enforce the prohibitory law, or what 
there was left of it, during that period were 
almost nugatory. In no way, as it seems 
to me, can a greater blow be given to the 
prohibitory law, or its purpose be more 
surely defeated, than by legalizing the sale 
of malt liquors. 

The Governor of the state in his 
inaugural address said: 

If we are to accept the evidence of those 
who have had the most painful experience 
of the miseries produced by these places 
(beer-shops), they are among the greatest 
obstacles to the social and moral progress of 
the community. 


8 


98 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Georgia experimented with a so- 
called “near” beer law which per¬ 
mitted the manufacture and sale of 
near or 2 per cent beer. This law was 
passed in 1908. The results are stated 
as follows: 

This gave opportunity for the wholesale 
and retail sale of whisky, and the pro¬ 
hibitory law was almost a dead letter. The 
sale of near beer was a pretext; real beer was 
sold, and the beer joints smuggled whisky 
to any purchasers. 

After a test of seven years, a special 
session of the legislature enacted a 
drastic prohibition law in 1915 which 
repealed the near beer law and, among 
other things, prohibited the sale of all 
malted, fermented and brewed liquors 
of any kind or description, including 
near beer. This law is still in effect. 

Governor Farrington, of the Terri¬ 
tory of Hawaii, in a message to the 
American Legion convention a 'short 
time ago said: 

Hawaii has had an experience with this 
same light wine and beer movement. . . . 
We were told that light wine and beer were 
non-injurious beverages and if the people 
were allowed to get this light liquor they 
would avoid the poisonous stuff sold in the 
country and also the illicit sale of hard 
liquor would be reduced. 

The desired legislation was passed. . . . 
These dispensaries of so-called non-injuri¬ 
ous liquors did not fulfill one single promise 
of those who were responsible for the 
trial. . . . 

Drunkenness increased and the light wine 
and beer panacea, instead of being the 
solution of the problem and the promoter of 
real temperance, very rapidly became a 
universally recognized nuisance. It car¬ 
ried with it all the difficulties of high license 
and enjoyed the unsavory reputation of 
being the center of vice and often times 
community disorder. 

Having observed the experience of 
Hawaii in this matter, it seems to me this 
should prove a splendid example and pre¬ 
vent . . . falling into line with the so- 


called panacea which has . . . proved that 
as a cure it is worse than the disease. 

8 . Shall the old-fashioned beer and 
the old-fashioned saloon be allowed 
to return? 

As a matter of fact, the proposal to 
permit the manufacture and sale of 3 
per cent beer amounts to a proposal to 
restore much of the old-fashioned beer, 
because the brewers’ own statements 
show that the old beer contained ap¬ 
proximately 3 per cent of alcohol. For 
example, I quote from an advertise¬ 
ment published over the name of the 
United States Brewers’ Association, in 
the Jersey Journal, November 22d, 
1917: “Inasmuch as the brewers have 
reduced the alcoholic content of beer 
until it is today only fractionally in 
excess of 3 per cent, they have earned 
the right to call their produce a true 
temperance drink.” 

I quote again from a pamphlet en¬ 
titled, “What shall a man drink?” 
which was distributed a few years ago 
at the brewers’ booth at the Newark 
Industrial Exhibition: “One barrel of 
beer contains 31 gallons and weighs 263 
lbs. It contains: Alcohol by weight, 
9.2 lbs., or 3.4%.” 

A pamphlet entitled, “The Story of 
American Beer,” and stamped “Gott¬ 
fried Krueger Brewing Co.” quotes the 
report of the Committee of Fifty as 
concluding that American beer was 
found to contain 3j per cent of alcohol. 
A card distributed by the Manufac¬ 
turers’ and Merchants’ Association of 
New Jersey has the statement, “Amer¬ 
ican beer contains from 3 to 5 per cent 
of alcohol.” 

If these statements are true there is 
very little, if any, difference between 
the old-fashioned beer containing a 
fraction more than 3 per cent of alcohoi, 
and the beer which is now proposed, 
which it is said will have 2.75 per cent 
of alcohol by weight, which would be 


The Volstead Act 


99 


equivalent to 3.4 per cent by volume. 
In other words, this new kind of beer 
turns out to be the same old kind. 

If we have the same old kind of beer, 
it is practically certain that we shall 
soon have the same old kind of saloon. 
What would be the use of making 3 per 
cent beer unless it were sold for bever¬ 
age purposes—and where can it be sold 
unless places are found for that pur¬ 
pose? It has been suggested that beer 
should be sold in grocery stores. But 
the test of a saloon is not the fixtures 
therein. A saloon is not made such by 
the use of a bar or of a brass foot-rail. 
It is the nature of what is sold that 
characterizes a saloon. If beer be sold 
in grocery stores, the corner grocery 
would rapidly turn into a corner 
saloon. We find the most ardent of 
those who favor a modification of the 
Volstead Act do not favor (so they say) 
the restoration of the saloon. I sub¬ 
mit that, as a practical matter, the 
two are so joined together that they 
cannot be sundered. 

Conclusion 

In the light of these experiences it 
may be safely asserted that the states 
that had passed a prohibition law prior 
to the Eighteenth Amendment found 
that the test of one half of one per cent 
or less was the most effective for en¬ 
forcement. Is it possible that human 
nature has changed? Should we dis¬ 
regard the lessons of experience? Can 
it be that the effect of intoxicating 
liquors upon individuals at the present 
time is different from what it has been 
for the past several thousand years? 

What assurance have we that light 
wines and beer, or that beer alone will 
tend to reduce the use of stronger 
liquors? France and Germany are 
frequently mentioned as examples, but 
the reports show that in these countries 
where light wines and beer are the 
common drink, the use of hard liquor 


is greater in proportion than it was in 
the United States. 

According to the official reports for 
1913, the people of Germany drank 
about 16 per cent more hard liquor 
than the people of this country, al¬ 
though, at the same time, they were 
drinking about 50 per cent more beer; 
the people of France drank nearly 70 
per cent more hard liquor than the 
people of this country, although, at the 
same time, they drank nearly fifty 
times as much wine per capita. This 
explodes the theory that the use of 
light wines and beer will decrease the 
use of hard liquor. 

What reason have we to believe that 
to legalize 3 per cent beer would result 
in better enforcement or would make 
the law more effective? Is it possible 
that the bootleggers who now sell 
alleged whisky and other strong liquors 
will immediately reform and engage in 
the sale of 3 per cent beer? Is it 
possible that those who patronize the 
bootlegger for the purpose of getting 
strong liquor will be satisfied with 3 
per cent beer—especially if that beer 
does not have enough “kick” to be in 
fact intoxicating? 

In view of these facts I desire to ask 
Senator Edge these questions, which it 
seems to me fairly state the issue be¬ 
tween us: 

(1) Do you favor congressional 
legislation to enforce the Eighteenth 
Amendment, similar to that of the 
46 state prohibition laws or in con¬ 
flict with them? 

(2) Should not Congress follow 
the uniform experience of the states 
in determining what is necessary to 
enforce prohibition or should Con¬ 
gress accept a standard which is 
advocated by the opponents of the 
law and which has always proven a 
failure in our country? 

(3) Is not the test in determining 
the alcoholic content of prohibited 




100 


The Annals of the American Academy 


liquors what is necessary to enforce 
the prohibition law rather than what 
alcoholic content will actually in¬ 
toxicate? 

(4) Do you think Congress can 
legalize beer with more than one 
half of one per cent alcohol in those 
states that have prohibited it by 
state law? If not, what good pur¬ 
pose can be served by a federal law 
that will mislead the people into 
violation of their state law? 

(5) How can the Eighteenth 
Amendment be uniformly enforced 
by any plan which uniform experi¬ 
ence has demonstrated would nullify 
the law? 

(6) Will you name any state that 
has ever had a prohibition law per¬ 
mitting 2 or 2.75 per cent beer 
which still retains it, or which ever 
successfully enforced it? 

(7) Shall we take any step that 
will in the slightest degree tend to 
bring back the scourge as described 
in a recent speech of Commander 
Booth of the Salvation Army—a 
scourge which, as she said: 

Has drained more blood, hung more 
crepe, sold more homes, plunged more 
people into bankruptcy, armed more vil¬ 
lains, slain more children, snapped more 
wedding rings, defiled more innocence, 
blinded more eyes, twisted more limbs, de¬ 
throned more reason, wrecked more man¬ 
hood, dishonored more womanhood, broken 
more hearts, blasted more lives, driven 
more to suicide and dug more graves than 
any other poisoned scourge that ever swept 
its death-dealing waves across the world. 

Do you agree with the recent state¬ 
ment of President Harding: 

In every community men and women 
have had an opportunity now to know what 
prohibition means. They know that debts 
are more promptly paid, that men take 
home the wages that once were wasted in 
saloons; that families are better clothed and 
fed, and more money finds its way into the 
savings banks. The liquor traffic was 


destructive of much that was precious in 
American life. In the face of so much evi¬ 
dence on that point, what conscientious 
man would want to let his own selfish 
desires influence him to vote to bring it 
back? In another generation I believe that 
liquor will have disappeared, not merely 
from our politics, but from our memories. 

With particular reference to 2.75 per 
cent beer, I quote from the public 
statement of Hon. John F. Kramer, 
who was the first federal Prohibition 
Commissioner. He said: 

If we start with 2.75 per cent beer, all the 
forces at the disposal of the Government, 
federal, states, and local, could not regulate 
and control it. It would be light beer 
today, heavy beer and wine tomorrow, and 
whisky and alcohol the next day. We 
would have the intolerable situation of 
having prohibition in theory but a drunken 
debauch in practice. 

But if it be claimed that Mr. Kramer, 
by reason of the fact that he w r as the 
Prohibition Commissioner, is preju¬ 
diced on the subject, then let us call 
another witness. I refer to the one 
man in American history who lias held 
the two highest positions in the nation, 
namely, President of the United States 
and Chief Justice of the United States 
Supreme Court. Prior to the passage 
of the Eighteenth Amendment and 
while it was still under consideration, 
Chief Justice Taft frankly announced 
himself as opposed to prohibition as the 
public policy of the country and spoke 
and wrote against the adoption of the 
Eighteenth Amendment. It may there¬ 
fore fairly be said that he was never 
prejudiced in favor of prohibition. 
After the Amendment was adopted, he 
made the following statement in the 
Chicago Tribune of July 26, 1920: 

I am not in favor of amending the Vol¬ 
stead Act in respect to the amount of per¬ 
missible alcohol in beverages. I am not in 
favor of allowing light wines and beer to be 
sold under the Eighteenth Amendment. I 
believe it would defeat the purpose of the 


The Volstead Act 


101 


Amendment. No such distinction as that 
between wines and beer, on the one hand, 
and spirituous liquors, on the other, is 
practicable as a police measure. . . . Any 
such loophole as light wines and beer would 
make the Amendment a laughing stock. 

In view of the uniform experience of 
this and other nations, why should we 
change the law because criminals vio¬ 


late it? Is it not more sensible to 
enforce the law as it is written? 
Should we modify the law on the plea 
of “back to the Constitution,” when 
experience shows that the modification 
which is now proposed would prevent 
the effective enforcement of the Con¬ 
stitution? Shall we go forward or 
shall we go back? 


Men, Machinery and Alcoholic Drink 

By Charles Reitell 

University of Pittsburgh 


Introduction 

IVILIZATION has taken unto 
itself machinery. For better or 
for worse the machine has arisen dur¬ 
ing the last century to a most powerful 
and dominant influence in the affairs 
of men. Invention has crowded upon 
invention until the hand tool has be¬ 
come the colossal hydraulic hammer; 
the wooden water wheel, the 100,000 
horse-power turbine; the oxcart with 
its slow, steady pull, the twentieth- 
century limited. 

It should be emphasized that these 
long series of changes in mechanical 
invention have given rise to correspond¬ 
ing changes in type and kind of human 
effort necessary in the operation of 
machine industry. Evidences of this 
are everywhere. The green-groomed 
cabby and the hostler have given way 
to the trim chauffeur and auto machin¬ 
ist; the rough and ready stage driver 
has long since been replaced by the 
highly trained locomotive engineer; 
and the strong and robust Slav— 
“thick-necked and broad of back”— 
must step aside with his pick and 
shovel and watch the mechanical 
ditch digger which, under the guidance 
and control of a skilled and licensed 
engineer, can dig more trench in a day 
than twenty-five Slavic laborers could 
have accomplished in a week. 

This shift to mechanical methods, 
therefore, calls forth new kinds of 
work, new kinds of workers and new 
forms of industrial management. And 
what is more important, the shift 
brings into being definite prohibitions, 
and clear-cut demands upon all workers 
who are to fit into this machine process. 


Of these prohibitions the outstanding 
one is this: that the growth in com¬ 
plexity, high speed and involved dan¬ 
gers of modern machinery absolutely 
bars out the use of alcoholic drink. 

Human life, costly machinery and 
continuous industrial operation—all 
are at stake when muddled alcoholic 
brains operate the machinery. Civi¬ 
lization, having developed high-pow¬ 
ered, costly machines, is seeing to it 
that clear-headed men are employed in 
the operation of such machines. There 
is no difficulty in finding that alcohol 
is inimical to machine work the very 
moment one observes the changed de¬ 
mands that machinery has made upon 
the workers: and just so soon as one 
sees these changed demands, then just 
so soon sobriety appears as an eco¬ 
nomic necessity. Viewing the ques¬ 
tion from this angle, we find alcohol¬ 
ism less an ethical issue and more an 
economic one. Complex machines 
and befuddled brains cannot work to¬ 
gether and much of this present-day 
prohibition is but an aftermath of the 
economic pressure that the industrial 
world has put forth in order to protect 
workers, machines and production 
from the ravages of men under the 
influence of alcohol. 

Mechanical Evolution and 
Changing Labor Types 

In order to see clearly the influence 
that modern invention has had in the 
prohibition of alcoholic drink, it will 
be necessary: 

1. To observe the changes in types 
and kind of labor effort that machinery 
has wrought. 

2. To analyze the nature of new 



102 


Men, Machinery and Alcoholic Drink 


103 


dangers that have come hand in hand 
with mechanical development. 

A brief discussion of the trend in a 
few of the more important industries 
follow: 

COAL 

The mining of coal is one of the 
largest basic American industries. In 
it are involved nearly three quarters of 
a million workers. Within a space of 
thirty years mechanical methods have 
been developed to a point where more 
than 65 per cent of our coal is machine 
mined. In America mining machines 
came into use about 1890. In that 
year about five hundred machines 
were operated. Today, in 1923, there 
are more than twenty-two thousand 
machines in operation. In Pennsyl¬ 
vania in 1896 approximately 12 per 
cent of bituminous coal was mined by 
machines, while in 1922 machine- 
mined coal is more than 65 per cent of 
the total production. 

The following table shows the in¬ 
creased use of mining machines in the 
production of bituminous coal: 


Year 

Number 
of Mining 
Machines 
in Use 

Percentage 

Mined 

by 

Machines 

1891. 

545 

5.3 

1900. 

3,907 

24.9 

1905. 

9,184 

32.8 

1910. 

13,254 

41.8 

1911. 

13,829 

43.9 

1912. 

15,298 

46.8 

1913. 

16,379 

50.6 

1914. 

16,507 

51.7 

1915. 

15,692 

55.1 

1916. 

16,198 

56.4 

1917. 

17,235 

55.5 

1918. 

18,463 

55.9 


The results of this change to machine 
methods are pronounced. Mining 
coal by machinery has partly removed 
and greatly altered the physical work 


of mining and in addition it has called 
forth such mental effort as is needed to 
manipulate and control electrical ma¬ 
chinery. The coal industry shows 
definite changes from hand tools to air 
and electrically-driven machines. The 
mining machine demands constant 
vigilance on the part of the worker. 
Power comes from electric wires in¬ 
stead of human muscles. Once such 
electrical power is transformed into 
physical work it continues in motion to 
produce or play havoc until such 
power is turned off by the worker. 
From the turning on until the turning off 
of the power the worker must he on his 
guard. 

The introduction of mining ma¬ 
chines has also been a step toward 
greater functionalization in the mining 
industry. Today the machine miner 
does one thing—and that one thing to 
a great extent has been mapped out 
and directed by other brains than his. 
Under pick mining many functions 
were left to the miner himself. An 
officer in one of the large mining com¬ 
panies puts it this way: “The coal 
industry in its operation has developed 
to a place where it uses high-skilled 
men in planning, inaugurating im¬ 
proved methods and directing the 
work. The miners in the larger mines 
have shifted to what might be termed 
machine operators. Their work is cut 
out for them in advance and it is up to 
them to operate the machines according 
to instructions. Good machine min¬ 
ers are made up of younger men who 
are energetic and who can maintain 
a steady watchfulness over their 
machines.” 

COKE 

If one wishes to find an industry 
which has gone the whole way from 
manual to machine methods, he should 
turn to the production of coke. In 
the modern by-product coke plant 






























104 


The Annals of the American Academy 


the transition is complete. Coke 
making gives an excellent study of an 
industrial revolution from hand to 
machine methods. Under the beehive 
method, which is the earlier method, 
you had practically all the handling of 
coke carried on by hand. Both the 
charging and the pulling of the ovens 
was carried on by hand work. Later 
the beehive industry developed me¬ 
chanical methods, but never has the 
process become completely machine 
operated, as the by-product method is 
fast displacing the beehive industry. 

The contrast in the manual and 
machine methods is best seen in the 
operation known as drawing the coke. 
In the by-product method the machine 
operator is trained and highly skilled. 
He is depended on for the skill neces¬ 
sary to get the maximum coke drawn 
from the ovens leaving as little residue 
to be hand drawn as possible. In 
addition he is required to work very 
rapidly, as the faster the coke is drawn 
the less heat is wasted. He must also 
be careful to have a low percentage of 
broken coke and finally he must be 
very alert so that he does not damage 
his machine by bad passages. In 
contrast, the hand drawer of coke in 
the beehive process must be a heavy, 
strong, physical type. Hand drawing 
is hot, hard work. Pulling hot coke 
from an oven with it falling around 
one’s feet is no child’s play in labor 
effort. After the coke is pulled by 
hand, more physical labor is required 
to shovel it into wheelbarrows and 
haul it to cars. Any untrained la¬ 
borer can step up to this job and do it 
without training and without expe¬ 
rience. 

The outstanding impression one 
gathers from study of the coke industry 
regarding labor types is this—that 
under the old beehive process, all the 
workers do hard, hot, physical labor, 
while in the highly developed by¬ 


product processes, labor is required 
to attend to the movements of large, 
complex, power-driven machinery. 

One of the engineers at the by-prod¬ 
uct plants at Clairton, Pennsylvania, 
states that scarcely a solitary worker 
in the beehive process could be used in 
the by-product plant and, when in¬ 
quiry was made regarding the use of 
intoxicating liquors among workers in 
the by-product plant, he stated flatly 
that the dangers to machinery, to 
production in the coke division, and 
especially the dangers to human life 
in possible explosions in the by-product 
divisions, made it absolutely compul¬ 
sory to bar the use of alcoholic drink 
on the part of the workers. 

CRUDE IRON AND STEEL 
INDUSTRIES 

Both blast furnaces and the open 
hearth industries have gone through a 
revolution from hand to machine 
methods within the last twenty-five 
years. In the blast furnace, the com¬ 
ing in of the larry car, skip hoist, mud- 
gun, mechanical skimmer, automatic 
weighers, and piggery machinery have 
meant the going out of literally 
thousands of laborers who had to do 
strenuous physical work. In their 
place have come in machine operators 
who have to be alert in guiding and 
directing machines. 

The following table gives in con¬ 
densed form the mechanical equipment 
that has come into the blast furnace 
industry, the duties of the machine 
operators and the nature of the work 
of the previous manual methods. It 
should be noted that the duties under 
the new operations are primarily 
mental and nervous requirements as 
contrasted with physical requirements 
under the old methods. 

In the open hearth industry, we 
find the same general trend which 
characterizes the blast furnace in- 


Men, Machinery and Alcoholic Drink 105 


Mechanical Inventions and Changing Labor Demands 


Machine or 
Mechanical 
Equipment 

What the 
Machine Does 

Duties of Machine 
Operator 

Duties of Workers 
Under Previous 
Hand Methods 

Car Dumpers 

Turns over regular R. R. 
cars, dumps contents in 
chutes and bins. 15 to 
20 cars per hour. 

Sits in operator’s cabin, 
throws several control 
levers. Skilled work. 

Pick and shovel unloading 
from freight cars. Un¬ 
skilled work. 

Ore Bridge 

Transfers ore from storage 
piles to operating bins. 

Typical work of craneman 
of higher grade. Skilled 
work. 

Shoveled into barrows and 
wheeled to furnace. Un¬ 
skilled work. 

Larry Car 

Electrically fills from bins, 
weighs, and distributes 
coke, ore and limestone 
to skip cars. 

Typical work of motor- 
man on street car. Semi¬ 
skilled. 

Shoveled into barrows and 
wheeled to elevators. 
Unskilled work. 

Skip Hoist 

Electrically carries stock 
to top of furnace. 

One operator semi-skilled 
who operates motor. 

(1) Furnaces built on hill¬ 
side and stock carried 
and wheeled to furnace. 

(2) Elevator and top-fillers. 
All unskilled. 

Bates Cinder 
Notch Stopper 

Takes care of slag and 
cinder, breaking it up 
at slag hole. 

One man unskilled, needed 
to operate lever. 

Several men needed with 
pokers. Unskilled, hard, 
physical work. 

Vaugh Mud 
Gun 

Plugs tap holes with mud. 

Put in position and oper¬ 
ated by one man. No 
skill required. 

Three or four men dis¬ 
placed. Work of plug¬ 
ging by hand very hot 
and very dangerous. 

Electric and 

Air Drills 

Taps furnace for casting. 

One semi-skilled operator 
and helper. 

Hand drills—slow, hot and 
dangerous. 

Killeen 

Skimmer 

Skims slag from ore. 

One unskilled operator at 
casting time. 

Several unskilled workers 
doing very dangerous 
operation. 

Casting 

Machine 

Casts molten iron into 
final pig-iron shapes. 

5 to 10 men, 2 to 4 skilled 
or semi-skilled. 

18 to 20 unskilled pig-bed 
men. Hardest, most 
arduous physical labor. 

Electric 

Cranes 

Various hauling and carry¬ 
ing purposes. 

Cranemen, semi-skilled, 
operates levers. 

Large amount of common 
laborers, who carried, 
hauled, shoveled and 
lifted materials. 


dustry. The open hearth gives an 
excellent example of the influence of 
machinery on the labor force. A few 
highly skilled and a large proportion of 
unskilled laborers which made up the 
labor force are now giving way to the 


dominance of machine operators. Ac¬ 
cording to one of the superintendents 
of the Bethlehem Steel Company the 
work on the charging level of the old 
type open hearth is the hardest and 
most strenuous of the whole industry. 




















106 


The Annals of the American Academy 


The heavy lifting of iron, the heat, 
glare and fumes from the open furnace 
make the work most exhausting. 
Negroes and Irish were employed al¬ 
most entirely. All wore heavy red 
flannel shirts to protect themselves 
from the excessive heat, and if it were 
not for the rest periods that occurred 
between the charging times, no human 
being could have endured the work for 
a continuous day. In the language of 
a worker: “It was working aside of 
hell ahead of time.” The coming in 
of machines changed all this arduous 
work so that now we quite often find 
an under-sized but nervously alert 
man handling the huge charging ma¬ 
chine with high-grade skill. The 
costliness of error that results from his 
mistakes and the continuous, unending 
watchfulness that he must exert dur¬ 
ing the day preclude such a worker 
from in any way befuddling his mind. 
In contrast the hand workers, phys¬ 
ically exhausted, found in stimulating 
drinks a real value. 

Under the old form of open hearth 
of fifty-ton capacity, one superintend¬ 
ent stated that one hundred and forty- 
two workers were needed in the plant 
and of these only ten were skilled 
laborers. To operate and maintain 
the same production in a newer form 
of open hearth but fifty-eight men 
were needed and of these twenty-eight 
had to be skilled. Upon investigation, 
it can be found that skilled workers in 
the open hearth industry can in no 
way afford to lessen their mental 
alertness in the operation of machinery. 
Handling hot metal, oftentimes over 
the heads of other workers, means that 
the machine operators must be on 
guard every minute of the day. 
Probably in no other industry is the 
penalty of mistakes so great as is found 
in the open hearth plants. The cost¬ 
liness of error is in direct ratio to the 
increase in mechanical methods. As 


one superintendent of the Carnegie 
Steel Company put it: “One error in 
judgment on the part of the operator 
of a charging machine may so injure 
either the machine or furnace or both 
that as much as two or three weeks 
may be required to make repairs.” 
He was more emphatic regarding the 
cranemen: “They must be exceed¬ 
ingly careful, working as they do at all 
times with molten metal over the 
heads of workers and near molds that 
topple with a slight jar.” After 
observing the gigantic machines and 
cranes in an open hearth, the conclusion 
is quickly reached that there has been 
no greater effective temperance force 
among open hearth workers than the 
coming in of these large machines. 

FINISHING MILLS 

Between the crude iron and steel 
industries and the foundry and machine 
shops are the rolling mills. Here, too, 
is observed the general trend in the 
introduction of large machines and 
mechanical devices which are chang¬ 
ing this industry from hand methods to 
mechanical appliances. Here, too, 
under the old hand methods workers 
could consume their alcohol with very 
little dangerous consequence, but the 
present operators of the large machines 
cannot afford to get under the influence 
of liquor and expect to carry on their 
work. The demands for clear minds 
to operate the manipulators, mechan¬ 
ical shears and roll tables are too severe 
and exacting to allow for indulgences. 

FOUNDRIES AND MACHINE 
SHOPS 

Contrary to our normal impressions, 
foundries are changing very rapidly to 
a machine basis of production. It can 
be stated that into every operation 
within a foundry even to the actual 
throwing and packing of sand about the 
patterns, machines have been intro- 


Men, Machinery and Alcoholic Drink 


107 


duced—charging machines, sand-cut- 
ting and screening machines, mixers, 
riddles, electric tamps, jarring ma¬ 
chines, sand slingers, molding and core 
making machines, tumblers, and sand 
blast machines—all spell the exit of 
hand methods. 

In foundries two general effects 
have resulted from this application of 
mechanical methods: 

1. The machine is eliminating much 
common labor—labor of whom is 
demanded little more than physical 
effort. The carrying, cleaning, lifting 
and sand handling formerly done by 
hand is now accomplished by ma¬ 
chinery. 

2. The machine has brought in 
machine operators and is displacing 
former trade work of the molder. 
Cranemen, chargers, molding and core 
making machine operators, and sand 
slinger men are now doing the work 
formerly carried on by the molders. 

A survey of modern foundries will 
show the coming in of operations that 
call for quick nervous activity and a 
going out of operations where muscle 
and brawn are the prerequisites. In 
short, the foundries are in keeping with 
the general trend found in industries 
as a whole. 

No industry embraces so large a 
field of activities as does the machine 
shop. Workers are seen using ma¬ 
chines that bore, drill, press, hammer, 
mill, plane, bend, chip, grind, shear, 
tap and saw. At one place is found a 
mechanic operating a lathe so small 
that it may be carried in his pocket, 
and so minute the piece of metal that 
he is working, that a magnifying glass 
must be used in the work. Again will 
be observed giant gun lathes turning 
pieces of steel weighing several tons. 

What an interesting industry as 
regards changing labor requirements! 
Here is an industry containing some¬ 
where between 900,000 and 1,000,000 


workers. Here the growth of mechan 
ical methods has reached its highest 
point, also the furthest development 
of standardization and scientific man¬ 
agement. But most interesting from 
the point of view of this article—here 
is found the highest degree of special¬ 
ization placed upon each worker. By 
standardization he is trained to operate 
a machine that performs the same work 
upon like pieces of metal unend¬ 
ingly. Coupled with this special¬ 
ization, each worker is made a connect¬ 
ing link in the chain of operations that 
constitute the plant’s activities. The 
worker thus specialized and related to 
total production is geared up to definite 
measured output. Should he falter, the 
whole chain of operations is weakened. 

View this development in machine 
industries in the light of the influence 
of intoxicating liquor. At once the 
antagonism that such liquor holds for 
continuous production is observed. 

In addition to the nervous require¬ 
ments that high-speed machinery has 
demanded of workers, there is also de¬ 
manded that he maintain a continuous 
measured output. He must keep go¬ 
ing throughout the day, energetic and 
clear-headed to the end. The Packard 
Motor Company and the Ford Motor 
Company have realized the importance 
of clear-headed workers and as a result 
both companies have been pioneers in 
forbidding the use of intoxicants at any 
time within or without the plant. As 
one of the officials of the Ford plant put 
it: “To attain a normal day’s pro¬ 
duction the workers must keep up an 
energetic gait for eight hours a day— 
this can only be done when a well-reg¬ 
ulated living is carried on by the 
workers in their home life. Worry, 
drunkenness, and sickness must all be 
eliminated if high-grade production is 
to be maintained.” 

The machine industries show that 
the penalty that will more and more 


108 


The Annals of the American Academy 


be attached to the American working¬ 
man who will have his booze is that he 
will find himself more and more unable 
to fit into the present-day industrial 
life. As the machines become more 
complex, more costly, of higher speed, 
and more scientifically organized, the 
quicker will the worker find this 
penalty applied. 

Specialized Labor and Socialized 
Danger 

The labor changes briefly noted in 
the above industries indicate a power 
and influence of the machine that we 
are wont to overlook. Over a space 
of time less than a century in length, 
physical labor has fast gone out of 
existence as an industrial demand, and 
in its place has come nervous energy. 
As the machine has developed and 
broadened in its scope, more and more 
has it specialized and limited the 
worker to a small number of definite 
functions. “Machine tender” classi¬ 
fies not thousands but veritably mil¬ 
lions of American working people. 
As machine tenders they are required 
to show dexterity, watchfulness and 
quite often a high degree of nervous 
control and directing power. 

Thus alcoholic drink attacks the 
most important asset the present-day 
worker must have if he is to function 
in machine industry, namely—nervous 
energy and an active brain. 

If the worker has been shorn of much 
physical effort and in addition has 
found his mental activity more and 
more limited to routine, watchfulness 
and dexterity, he on the other hand 
has grown much more powerful in an¬ 
other direction. Having a machine 
under his guidance and control, the 
dangers that ensue from mistakes have 
increased a thousandfold. Take the 
open hearth as an illustration. When 
loading of furnace was carried on by 
wheelbarrow, a mistake by the worker 


meant no real damage either to human 
life or property. With the mechan¬ 
ical loader how different the situation! 
A mistake may mean the death of 
several workers, a smashed furnace, a 
broken machine and seriously inter¬ 
rupted production. One superintend¬ 
ent has estimated a labor turnover 
cost of $3,000 per operator of charging 
machines, and this high cost is due to 
the great dangers involved should 
untrained, unreliable men be employed. 
Cranemen might be cited as another 
illustration. Working with moving 
overhead material, the workers under¬ 
neath are at the mercy of their judg¬ 
ment. We gain an excellent example 
of this broadening and socializing of 
danger when we consider the coming 
in of the automobile. How quickly 
the driver becomes dangerous to all, 
the very moment his driving and con¬ 
trol become faulty! The same is true 
of railroad engineers, of by-product 
coke makers, of power plant employees, 
of the hundred and one mechanical 
amusement operators, and of the 
operators of conveyor systems. In 
many instances the danger of mistakes 
may not affect human life, but large 
dangers to property and production 
are always involved. 

With this increased socialization of 
danger brought in by machinery, 
what attitude is to be expected from 
employers and the public regarding 
the consumption of drink? The 
answer is clear—the use of alcohol 
must stop. Employers seeing heavy 
losses to life and property and which 
losses they themselves must carry as 
their responsibility, have quickly 
ruled that liquor is a costly industrial 
menace and must not be tolerated. 
The public has been tardy in seeing 
the same menace abroad, and it is 
their responsibility that people under 
the influence of intoxicants drive the 
open roads. 


Men, Machinery and Alcoholic Drink 


109 


Conclusion 

A long-range view of mechanical 
evolution shows that under proper 
conditions machinery can be made to 
perform and does perform untold 
services for mankind. Just as the 
Greeks enslaved the humans to do the 
heavy, ugly, monotonous work so that 
they themselves could be free to do 
the more enjoyable, artistic things; so 
the machine is being enslaved to do 
heavy physical work. Higher stand¬ 
ards of living, shorter hours of labor, a 
greater development of art and a 
further elimination of motonony are 
dependent upon the advances that are 
made in machinery. But as this 
mechanical development has gone on 
it has demanded from the workers 
certain definite adjustments—out¬ 
standing of which is the demand for 
dexterity, watchfulness, care, nervous 
control and directing power sufficient 
to operate the mechanical equip¬ 
ment. 


Alcohol attacking as it does the 
nervous system thus becomes a menace 
to mechanico-industry. A menace:— 
first, because it lowers and endangers 
the productive power and organization 
of our industrial establishments; 
second, because it increases error on 
the part of workers which in machine 
industry means great losses to life and 
property. 

The machine is rigid in its demands. 
In order to work well and work safely 
it must be well manned. Human 
life, costly machines and continuous 
efficient operation are too valuable to 
be placed at the mercy of minds be¬ 
fuddled by intoxicants. 

When we realize how deep rooted 
these demands of modern industry are, 
it is then that we see the absolute im¬ 
possibility of mechanical advancement 
going hand in hand with alcoholism. 

John Barleycorn has been caught 
in the fast revolving machinery of 
American industry. There is no hope 
for him! 



The Effect of Prohibition on Industry from the View¬ 
point of an Employment Manager 

By Eugene J. Benge 

Office Personnel Manager, The Atlantic Refining Company, Philadelphia 


T HIS paper is written from the view¬ 
point of an employment manager. 
The employment manager should be 
interested not only in securing efficient 
employees, but also in following up 
their work to bring them to a high 
state of production on the one hand and 
to a high degree of morale on the other. 
It is from such an angle that the writer 
has attempted to discuss the effects of 
prohibition on industry. 

Industrial Development 

For centuries alcoholism and indus¬ 
try have been distant cousins in the 
social family. Within the last five 
decades, the two cousins became very 
friendly, indeed. There have been 
certain contributory factors which have 
aided in this closer association. 

The first contributing factor has been 
the increasing drive of work and the 
long hours. The decades preceding 
the present century were characterized 
industrially by the formation of large 
business organizations. Paralleling 
this aggregation was the development 
of the scientific management move¬ 
ment, often referred to as the efficiency 
movement, with its subdivision of 
operations and piece rate wage plans. 
During this same period strikes, bitter 
strife, rioting and similar manifesta¬ 
tions of industrial discontent were 
quite common. 

In an endeavor to discover a relation¬ 
ship between the hours worked and the 
consumption of alcohol, 1,000 workers 
were interviewed, prior to the advent 
of prohibition. It was discovered that 
about one third patronized saloons and 


over one half used liquor in some form. 
In answer to the question, “Do you 
drink before going to work?’’ the 
following statistics were obtained: 1 

Percentage Drinking 
Liquor Before 

Length of Working Day Going to Work 


From 8 to 9 hours. 10.1 

“ 9 “ 10 “ . 17.0 

“ 10 “ 11 “ . 14.5 

11 hours and over. 19.3 


The above figures would indicate 
that men starting a long working day 
felt the necessity of alcohol more than 
those beginning the short day. How¬ 
ever, the figures are not entirely con¬ 
clusive. It is probable that those who 
had short working hours had greater 
opportunity to imbibe at noon or in the 
evening and so would not feel the desire 
for alcohol early in the morning. It 
was found that 51.3 per cent drank 
liquor at noon. 

Secretary of Labor James J. Davis, 
in his interesting book entitled “The 
Iron Puddler,” quotes a workingman 
who says: 

Water does not always agree with the 
stomach as well as beer does. You never 
worked at terrific muscular exertion han¬ 
dling white hot iron in a mill like this. You 
haven’t got the muscles to do it, and I 
doubt if you’ve got the heart. You cannot 
know the condition a man is in when he hits 
his hardest like here. But they know. 
Some of them feel they can’t drink water 
at that time. My pal tells me that his 
stomach rejects it; his throat seems to 
collapse as he gulps it. But beer he can 

1 “Why Prohibition!” By Charles Stelze. Pub¬ 
lished by G. II. Doran Co., New York. 


110 






Effect of Prohibition on Industry 


111 


drink and it eases him. The alcohol in 
beer is a blessing at that time. It soothes 
his laboring stomach until the water can 
get into his system and quench the man’s 
thirst. Iron workers in the Old World 
have used malt beverages for generations. 
Why take away the other man’s pleasure 
if it doesn’t injure you? If it was deadly 
we w r ould have been weakened in the course 
of generations. But look at the worker’s 
body. It is four times as strong as yours. 

The second factor which has contrib¬ 
uted to a closer relationship between 
industrial life and John Barleycorn was 
the custom of paying wages prior to 
rest days. Particularly in the mining 
regions it w T as evident that the day or 
days following pay day were marked by 
absenteeism and alcoholic debauchery. 

In the investigation cited above the 
question was asked, “How do you 
spend your spare cash (money not 
spent for the necessities of life) ?” The 
following data were obtained: 


Beer. 23% 

Wine and whisky. 11% 

Movies and theatre. 24% 

Tobacco. 24% 

Life insurance. 11% 

Church. 6% 

Miscellaneous. 1% 


Total. 100% 


These two investigations, made dur¬ 
ing pre-prohibition days, typify the 
part which alcohol played in the lives 
of normal workingmen. 

Development of Prohibition 
Movement 

To one who studies the history of the 
prohibition movement, it is quite 
evident that it is a very old movement, 
and not a freakish development of the 
last decade. There are many who 
claim that the prohibitionists have, by 
a stroke of national strategy, “pulled 
the wool” over the eyes of the Ameri¬ 
can public. The evidence does not 


support this view. It appears more 
likely that the growing sentiment in 
favor of temperance was finally crystal¬ 
lized in the form of the Eighteenth 
Amendment. 

Oddly enough it appears that the 
very industry which had accepted alco¬ 
hol as a boon companion was the potent 
factor in removing that companion 
when it became a menace. 

The railroads early recognized the 
danger in alcoholism and forebade their 
employees upon penalty of dismissal to 
drink while on duty. Realizing that 
this move was in the interest of safety, 
public opinion sanctioned this rule. 
Again, employers began to realize that 
many industrial accidents were due 
directly or indirectly to drink and so 
excluded it during working hours. 

At the forty-sixth National Con¬ 
ference of Social Work, 1919, Irving 
Fisher, professor of economics at Yale 
University, said: 

Another force for prohibition is the force 
of industrialism and of the modern desire 
for efficiency both on the part of industries 
and on the part of individuals. Industry is 
applying modern science. From two to 
four glasses of beer will reduce the output 
of typesetters by 8 per cent. These and 
other experiments demonstrate that we will 
increase, by enforcing prohibition, the eco¬ 
nomic productivity of this nation from 10 
to 20 per cent, and will add to the national 
output of the U. S. between 7| to 15 billion 
dollars’ worth of product, every year, 
reckoned at the moderate level of prices. 
These forces, the ideals of work, the re¬ 
quirements of modern industrial competi¬ 
tion, the findings of modern science and the 
ideals of morality in American life are the 
forces which have put over prohibition, and 
it must be on these forces that we shall 
depend to enforce prohibition. 

The last decade has revealed re¬ 
markable strides in the field of employ¬ 
ment management. Among other im¬ 
portant developments there has been 
great improvement in working condi- 











The Annals of the American Academy 


112 

tions and also in the facilities for eating 
which are offered employees. These 
two factors have partially counteracted 
the original conditions which were said 
to have enforced the necessity for 
alcohol. 

From a physiological standpoint the 
case against King Alcohol seems to be 
clean cut. Statistics show that the 
death rate of brewery workers was 52 
per cent higher than the “expected 
deaths.” Saloon proprietors and man¬ 
agers who attended bar showed an 
increase of 78 per cent. These figures 
were obtained from an actuarial study 
of some 2,000,000 cases covering a 
period of about 25 years. Other in¬ 
surance records show that the mortality 
for non-abstainers was two to four times 
as high as that for total abstainers. 

Medical evidence shows that alcohol 
weakens resistance to disease. Pneu¬ 
monia has been cited as a concrete 
example of a disease affected by alcohol. 

So far the evidence presented has 
been based mostly on historical facts or 
statistical records. Most of the data 
were obtained prior to the passage of 
the Volstead Act. It is but natural to 
ask whether the conclusions of business 
leaders confirm the a 'priori expectations 
of statistical evidence. 

To determine the concensus of opin¬ 
ion the writer has followed three 
courses: 

(1) A study of published statements. 

(2) A garnering of verbal statements 
from fellow employment managers. 

(3) A study of the statistics avail¬ 
able, together with an expression of his 
own conclusions. 

In the published literature available, 
the writer finds the following quotation 
ascribed to Albert E. Potter, President 
and General Manager of the United 
Electric Railway Company: 

Prohibition has decreased troubles grow¬ 
ing out of drinking among our men. . . . 

This means a large gain in efficiency and. 


in the case of platform men especially, an 
increase in the safety of operation. 

The Commercial Research Division 
of the Curtis Publishing Company, of 
Philadelphia, made a study of national 
prohibition in 1920. Those sections of 
their report which relate to the field of 
the employment manager are quoted 
below: 

Employers 

Employers in all industries agree that the 
average productive power of workingmen 
is increased by prohibition. Marked una¬ 
nimity of opinion prevails on this point 
even among those who acknowledge an 
interest in alcoholic beverages themselves. 

Regularity of Attendance 

Before the advent of prohibition, Mon¬ 
days, days after holidays and days after 
pay days were periods of large percentage 
of absences and low production. The ex¬ 
tent to which an industry was affected 
appeared to depend partly on the grade 
and character of workmen employed. In 
some respects, concerns using a majority of 
foreign laborers, such as those engaged in 
coal mining and the operation of steel 
mills, seem to have had the most trouble. 
But the degree of skill of the workmen does 
not appear to be a w r holly satisfactory 
guide. For example, the building trades 
and engineering construction seem in many 
cases to have suffered as badly as business 
depending on common unskilled labor. 

In every instance in which inquiry w r as 
made, there was found to be a large de¬ 
crease in absence from work since prohibi¬ 
tion. A machine tool manufacturer in 
Cincinnati reports a decrease to one sixth 
of the usual number of Monday absences. 
An executive of a railroad employing in the 
neighborhood of 200,000 men states: “I 
should estimate that there is a decrease of 
about 40 per cent in the number of ab¬ 
sentees on the day after pay days.” 

Similarly, two of the largest automobile 
manufacturers in the United States re¬ 
ported that the decrease in Monday ab¬ 
sences since prohibition is very marked. 
In speaking of the absence of his warehouse 
men, the owner of a metropolitan depart- 


Effect of Prohibition on Industry 


113 


ment store states: “Before prohibition 20 
per cent absence on Monday was usual. 
Now all of our men not confined by sick¬ 
ness are on the job.” 

Production 

Irregularity of attendance and the rela¬ 
tive unfitness for work of many men who 
reported often produced noticeable results 
on volume of production. 

The president of several associated 
corporations operating coal mines in eastern 
Pennsylvania states: “The effect of pro¬ 
hibition on the business of coal mining 
promises to be tremendous. On the day 
after Christmas in 1919, more coal was 
produced from our mines than ever before 
on a day after a big holiday.” 

The general superintendent of coal and 
coke operations, employing over 18,000 
men who are paid biweekly, states that his 
company faced the liquor problem in terms 
of inefficient workmen and irregularity of 
production: the weeks after pay days were 
always weeks of lower average production, 
other things being equal, than the weeks 
before pay days. This was simply because 
the trucks of booze which came in on Satur¬ 
day kept many of the men boozed up until 
Tuesday or Wednesday and they did not 
show up for work, or were in such condition 
that they had to be sent home. 

A capitalist, said to be heavily interested 
in coal lands as well as distilleries in the 
coal regions, stated: “So far as its effect 
on the workers in the coal-mining sections 
of the country is concerned, there is only 
one answer. Upon that all of us are agreed. 
It is not too much to say that efficiency of 
the men has increased one third.” 

A chief executive of a large coal company 
in Pennsylvania, situated in the midst of the 
Connellsville coal fields, speaks of prohibi¬ 
tion in these words: “The first thing in 
regard to prohibition that came to my 
attention was the effect of the closing of the 
saloons at the time of the ‘flu’ epidemic. 
Between the time that the saloons were 
closed as a preventive measure and the 
time when a large number of men had 
fallen victims of the ‘flu’ and were therefore 
incapacitated, our mines came to their 
greatest production. In other words, in 
spite of the handicap of the ‘flu 5 epidemic 

9 


in its early stages, the advantage to our 
business from the closing of the saloons was 
enough greater to result in record produc¬ 
tion—nearly one sixth greater than a month 
earlier.” 

Accidents 

Prohibition has been in force too short a 
time to have compiled definite statistics of 
its effect on the number of industrial 
accidents. However, the thought was 
expressed that the number of accidents will 
decrease under the new regime. 

The hours of most frequent accidents in 
steel mills have been identified as the times 
directly after the men have left the plant 
and have had access to liquor. Despite the 
extra hazards of night work, accidents are 
reported to have been fewest then because 
the men were not allowed to leave the mills. 

It is well known that, in the interest of 
public safety, railroads have for years re¬ 
fused employment to train operators ad¬ 
dicted to drink. With all these precautions, 
the opinion is expressed by an executive of 
one of the largest railroads in the United 
States that a decrease of at least 10 per cent 
in the number of accidents to employees is 
expected to result from prohibition. 

That the accident problem in the auto¬ 
mobile industry will be simplified is sug¬ 
gested by the employment manager of one 
of the largest manufacturers: “It has also 
cut down our number of industrial accidents. 
Especially after the noon hour we used to 
have many accidents. A man would get a 
few drinks in him and he would feel like tak¬ 
ing a chance and a man can’t take a chance 
around a place like this without getting 
hurt.” 

Industrial Disorders 

The effect which prohibition will have on 
industrial unrest is not yet clearly deter¬ 
mined. However, its help in maintaining 
order in time of strike has been noteworthy. 
This was particularly marked during the 
recent strike in the steel industry. An 
executive of one of the largest companies 
affected expressed an opinion which seemed 
to be general: “We believe that, next to 
the state police, the strongest influence in 
maintaining order was the difficulty of 
getting booze and its high price. It is 
among saloon loiterers that rough stuff 


114 


The Annals of the American Academy 


starts—and it could not have been con¬ 
trolled if whisky flowed freely.” 

Another executive stated: “A strike 
cannot be prolonged unless there is plenty 
of booze to ‘keep up the spirits of the men.’ ” 

On the other hand, it was suggested that 
under prohibition the men can save money 
more rapidly and are, therefore, in a better 
position to hold out on their demands. 
That this was the fact in the Washington 
lumbermen’s strike was mentioned in the 
hearings before the Commission appointed 
by the Secretary of Labor. 

The National Credit Men’s Associa¬ 
tion has gone on record as approving of 


prohibition because it had a positive 
tendency to wipe out the bad debt bug¬ 
aboo. An example of this is given 
from the experience of one Collection 
House: 2 

Percentage of 
Outstanding Accounts 
Month Collected Weekly 

July, 1918. 2.42 

July, 1919. 3.75 

May, 1920. 5.15 

(Last full month at time figures were 
supplied) 

2 The Survey, November 6, 1920. 


Prohibition 

Beneficial 


Prohibition 
Not Benefical 


Doubtful 

Has Not 
Been Given 
Fair Trial 



66 % &7% 6 % / % 

Figure 1.—Poll of 526 Union Leaders 
“ Has prohibition been a benefit to the workingmen and their families? ” 
















Effect of Prohibition on Industry 


115 


Poll of Union Leaders 

The comments of union leaders are 
of interest. The Literary Digest , 
March 13, 1920, reports a poll of some 
526 labor leaders. A letter was sent to 
each one asking: “Has prohibition been 
a benefit to the workingmen and their 
families?” Thirty per cent of the 
replies indicated that a vote had been 
taken at the regular meeting of the 
union. As shown in the accompanying 
chart (Figure 1), two thirds of the 
replies of these acknowledged labor 
leaders indicated that prohibition had 
been a benefit to the union members. 
The actual figures are given below: 

Has Prohibition Been a Benefit to the 
Workingmen and Their Families? 


Answer 

Number 

Per cent 

Yes. 

345 

66 

No. 

143 

27 

Doubtful. 

31 

6 

Has not been given a fair 
trial. 

7 

1 

Total. 

526 

100 


There are numerous scattered state¬ 
ments of labor leaders which indicate 
that prohibition tended to raise the 
standards of workingmen the country 
over. 

Poll of Business Men 

A survey of hundreds of representa¬ 
tive business and professional men 
yielded the following: 3 

For prohibition in some form. . . 98.50 


Against prohibition. 1.50 

Total 100.00% 

A further analysis of the 98.50 per 
cent in favor of prohibition gave the 
following: 

For straight prohibition. 85.50 

For beer and wine. 7.00 

For various modifications of law 3.25 

Noncommittal. 2.75 

Total... 98.50% 


3 “The Prohibition Question.” Published by 
Manufacturers Record Publishing Company, 
Baltimore, Md., 1922. 


Lord Leverhulme, one of the fore¬ 
most of British business men, is quoted 
as saying that Great Britain would 
save enough in five years of prohibition 
to pay off her entire debt to the United 
States. 

A Committee of Fifty made a case 
study of the effect of liquor upon 
pauperism and crime, involving some 
56,000 individuals. 4 It was found 
that pauperism was directly attribut¬ 
able to the liquor habit in 25 per 
cent of the instances. Alcohol was 
blamed for 37 per cent of the paupers 
in almshouses and for 46 per cent 
of the neglected children who be¬ 
came public charges. It was further 
charged as a primary cause of crime 
in 31 per cent of the cases and as a 
contributing cause to crime in 50 per 
cent. 

From the published statistics and 
opinions it seems that prohibition 
has increased thrift and home own¬ 
ing, has aided in raising the stand¬ 
ard of living and has decreased 
crime and many other social disorders. 
In a sense these are all related to 
the problem of the employment man¬ 
ager, for indirectly thrift or crime 
will find its expression in an in¬ 
creased or decreased sum total of 
production. 

Contrary Opinions 

The expressions of opinion or fact 
which have been reproduced so far have 
all tended to uphold the prohibition 
stand. It is very regrettable that 
many who hold an opposite viewpoint 
have failed to publish their honest con¬ 
victions. Occasionally one reads a 
veiled statement such as the following, 
which suggests that the author does 

4 “Confessions of a Prohibitionist,” Henry 
W. Farnam, Connecticut Federation of Churches, 
27 Louis Street, Hartford, Conn. 
















116 


The Annals of the American Academy 


TABLE I— Company A Statistics Showing 

1. Monthly turnover 

2. Average number working (monthly) 

3. Week-end absenteeism 

. Week-end absenteeism ,. 

4. -;— (in %) 

Average number working 

Jan., 1919, to May, 1923, inclusive 



Monthly 

Turnover 

Average Number 
Working 

Week-end 

Absence 

o 

£ 

o fi 

O 

i| - 
“ & 

o z i 

O > 50 
H < j 
< o o 
Ph H U 

o 

U 

1919 





Jan. 

14.0 

4,900 

185 

3.8 

Feb. 

11.0 

5,200 

210 

4.0 

Mar. 

10.0 

5,150 

200 

3.9 

Apr. 

12.0 

5,100 

175 

3.4 

May .... 

10.0 

5,125 

180 

3.5 

June .... 

11.0 

5,300 

185 

3.5 

July. 

12.0 

5,200 

175 

3.4 

Aug. 

12.0 

5,175 

185 

3.6 

Sept. 

12.0 

5,175 

115 

2.2 

Oct. 

10.0 

5,175 

180 

3.5 

Nov. 

8.0 

5,050 

115 

2.3 

Dec. 

8.0 

5,000 

100 

2.0 

1920 





Jan. 

9.0 

4,900 

100 

2.0 

Feb. 

10.0 

4,925 

110 

2.2 

Mar. 

13.0 

5,000 

160 

3.2 

Apr. 

17.0 

4,650 

120 

2.6 

May .... 

16.5 

4,350 

105 

2.4 

June .... 

12.2 

4,125 

105 

2.5 

July. 

11.8 

4,200 

100 

2.4 

Aug. 

15.8 

4,150 

100 

2.4 

Sept. 

12.5 

4,300 

90 

2.1 

Oct. 

14.5 

4,575 

95 

2.1 

Nov. 

11.8 

4,950 

20 

.4 

Dec. 

12.2 

4,825 

10 

.2 



Monthly 

Turnover 

Average Number 

Working 

Week-end 

Absence 

Ratio of Absence 

to Av. No. Working 

C ol. 3 / 07a 

a 

r 

H 

©I 

C 

O 

1921 





Jan. 

10.0 

4,300 

60 

1.4 

Feb. 

6.5 

4,200 

50 

1.2 

Mar. 

14.2 

3,700 

45 

1.2 

Apr. 

8.5 

3,650 

40 

1.1 

May. 

4.5 

3,600 

70 

1.9 

June. 

6.5 

3,500 

40 

1.1 

July. 

10.1 

3,125 

50 

1.6 

Aug. 

7.0 

3,100 

45 

1.5 

Sept. 

9.5 

3,175 

50 

1.6 

Oct. 

9.0 

3,450 

45 

1.3 

Nov. 

8.0 

3,650 

40 

1.1 

Dec. 

13.5 

4,200 

60 

1.4 

1922 





Jan. 

15.6 

4,200 

130 

3.1 

Feb. 

14.5 

3,800 

85 

2.2 

Mar. 

13.5 

3,700 

85 

2.3 

Apr. 

14.0 

3,725 

105 

2.8 

May. 

16.0 

3,800 

120 

3.2 

June. 

19.6 

3,750 

60 

1.6 

July. 

22.0 

3,725 

120 

3.2 

Aug. 

21.0 

3,700 

120 

3.2 

Sept. 

18.5 

3,725 

90 

2.4 

Oct. 

16.2 

3,825 

100 

2.6 

Nov. 

14.2 

3,850 

110 

2.9 

Dec. 

12.0 

3,825 

110 

2.9 

1923 





Jan. 

15.0 

3,825 

165 

4.3 

Feb. 

14.0 

3,850 

110 

2.9 

Mar. 

15.0 

3,900 

200 

5.1 

Apr. 

18.8 

3,850 

200 

5.2 

May. 

16.0 

4,120 

115 

2.8 















































































Effect of Prohibition on Industry 


117 


not believe that the prohibition move¬ 
ment has had a beneficial effect on 
industry: 

So far as prohibition helping output is 
concerned, we cannot say definitely, but 
the writer knows in his movements through¬ 
out the factory that there appears to be 
more sickness among our older employees, 
which is accounted for by them on the 
ground that they were in the habit of hav¬ 
ing a glass of beer with their dinner; that in 
lieu of beer they are obliged to take medi¬ 
cine to cure bodily difficulties and that they 
are less fit for work and so are obliged to 
remain at home. In other words, men who 
were practically always at their daily work 
are now frequently absent, and the above is 
the reason given; and as we already said, 
they are among our oldest and most 
reliable men. 

The author of this paper did not set 
out either to prove or disprove the 
claims of the prohibitionist. His task 
is merely the gathering of data pro and 
con. He has found a greater willing¬ 
ness on the part of those opposed to 
prohibition to give a verbal expression 
rather than a written statement in this 
direction. 

For example, the employment man¬ 
ager of a large publishing house stated 
that prohibition had had a neutral 
effect upon his organization in regard to 
absenteeism, and further said that it 
had caused some sickness on account of 
the bad quality of liquor which was 
being obtained surreptitiously. He 
also decried the growing disregard for 
law on the part of workingmen as well 
as other social groups. His statement 
was given as a personal opinion and not 
as an official statement from his organ¬ 
ization. 

Another employment manager con¬ 
nected with a large organization which 
manufactures automobile parts stated 
that he had failed to find any beneficial 
effects from prohibition in his organ¬ 
ization. 


Statistics of Week-end 
Absenteeism 

So many references have been made 
to the decreased week-end absenteeism 
which is supposed to have resulted 
from prohibition that the writer secured 
data from an organization normally 

TABLE II— Company A Statistics of 
Table I 

Expressed Quarterly, Showing 

1. Monthly turnover 

2. Average number working (monthly) 

3. Week-end absenteeism 

Week-end absenteeism ^ \ 

Average number working 
Jan., 1919, to May, 1923, inclusive 



Monthly 

Turnover 

Average Number 
Working 

Week-end 

Absence 

Ratio of Absence 

to Av. No. Working 

Col. 3 

/ _ _ CT 7 \ 

z; 

■H 

►4 

O 

U 

1919 

1. 

11.7 

5,083 

198 

3.9 


2. 

11.0 

5,175 

180 

3.5 


3. 

12.0 

5,150 

158 

3.1 


4. 

8.7 

5,075 

132 

2.6 


1920 

1. 

10.7 

4,942 

123 

2.5 


2. 

15.2 

4,375 

110 

2.5 


3. 

13.4 

4,217 

97 

2.3 


4. 

9.8 

4,783 

42 

.9 


1921 

1. 

10.2 

4,067 

52 

1.3 


2. 

6.5 

3,583 

50 

1.4 


3. 

8.9 

3,133 

48 

1.6 


4. 

10.2 

3,767 

48 

1.3 


1922 

1. 

14.5 

3,900 

100 

2.5 


2. 

16.5 

3,758 

95 

2.5 


3. 

20.5 

3,717 

110 

2.9 


4. 

14.1 

3,833 

107 

2.8 


1923 

1. 

14.7 

3,858 

158 

4.1 


2. 

17.4 

3,985 

158 

4.0 



































118 / 


The Annals of the American Academy 


employing about 4,000 men. This 
company had for some time computed 
its week-end absenteeism by subtract¬ 
ing the number working Saturday from 
those working Friday and adding the 
resultant to a similar subtraction made 
of those present Monday from those in 
attendance on Tuesday. We can 
present this method by a simple for¬ 
mula such as follows: 

A=(F—S) + (T—M) 

Week-end absenteeism equals (Friday 
minus Saturday) plus (Tuesday minus 
Monday). 

While there are certain theoretical 
objections to this method of comput¬ 
ing week-end absenteeism, it was felt 
that it would show a decided trend if 
any existed. In this particular organ¬ 
ization the index of week-end absen¬ 
teeism had been followed faithfully 
since January, 1919. For several 


years there had been a sharp drop, 
which had been attributed to the bene¬ 
fits of prohibition. Unfortunately for 
this hypothesis the years 1921, 1922, 
1923 showed a steady increase in the 
index until it had almost attained the 
level of January, 1919. 

Believing that the trend was more 
indicative of conditions in the labor 
market than of any other factor, the 
writer requested data of labor turnover 
and of the monthly working force for 
the same period, viz.: January, 1919, to 
May, 1923, inclusive. The complete 
figures are shown herewith (Table I). 

Inasmuch as it is difficult for the 
mind to grasp the significance of these 
figures they were revised to show the 
same facts quarterly rather than 
monthly (Table II). It is on the basis 
of Table II, that the two charts (Fig¬ 
ures 2 and 3) have been drawn. 


+£00 5 D 


+ 150 SD 

V 





+ /.00 S D 

- v X 





+ .50 S D 

V 

_V- 



« 

»»■ 


♦« 

VN 


...* 


- .50 S D. 


\ \ 

* " 

_*_ 


/ 


- -100 SP 


* 

\ 

V 



-150 SD 


\ 




-aoo sd 

« 






/9/9 

J 9Z0 

I9Z! 

/ 9 

m3 


Figure 2. Comparison of Week-End Absenteeism with Average Number Working 
Jan., 1919, to May, 1923, inclusive expressed in deviations from average Unit-1 Standard Deviation 


Average No. Working ■ 
Week-End Absenteeism 































Effect of Prohibition on Industry 


119 


Figure 2 shows a comparison between 
week-end absenteeism and the working 
force. Inasmuch as these two variables 
were expressed in quite different units, 
each one has been translated into terms 
of its own standard deviation. The 


of Company A states that he would 
have been glad to obtain more men 
over this period had he been able, in 
which event the working force curve 
would probably have followed the 
absenteeism curve more closely. 



over 

n 

o 

-e 

U £ 

£ ^10 






turn 

Crr 

£ 7 

<0 1 

7 

/ 

✓ 

/ 

✓ 



-A—j 

/ \ / 
y \/ 


u 

O <D 
■A C 
.— 

~ ~ 10 

"c ' 

H c 
v ' 2 ao 



/ 

Ji 

-- 


'O 

t j 

<U 1 _ 

i O 
* 
o 

6 10 


\ 

\ 

X 

•Vw 



O 

£ 

^ 0 

.2 C 

*- ^0 0 









/?ao 



/3S3 


Figure 3. —Comparison of Monthly Labor Turnover with Index of Absenteeism 

(Ratio of week-end absenteeism to average number working expressed in per cent) 

Jan., 1919, to May, 1923, inclusive. 

Monthly Labor Turnover ®0HEEEfHSEBBis®a!flBSEBES3EEEaB 

Ratio of Absence to Av. No. Working kb a cn bu am ns os 

Average number working. Percent of absenteeism. 


central horizontal line represents the 
average for both curves. It is evident 
that there is considerable conformity in 
the two curves. Over 1919 and 1920 
the average number on the working 
force dropped steadily, as did the 
absenteeism. It is significant that, in 
point of time, the absenteeism curve 
precedes the working force curve in 
both the drop, and the rise which 
follows. This condition probably 
means that the workingman senses 
industrial conditions before the working 
force actually conforms to these conditions. 
In Figure 2, there appears to be con¬ 
siderable discrepancy between the two 
curves over the years 1922 and 1923. 
These years have been characterized 
by labor scarcity, so that the working 
force curve does not represent a good 
picture of the number of employees 
desired. The employment manager 


Figure 3 shows a comparison of labor 
turnover in Company A with week-end 
absenteeism. However, in Figure 3 
the absenteeism is not expressed as the 
actual total of absenteeism in any 
particular quarter of the year. Hav¬ 
ing established fairly satisfactory evi¬ 
dence of the relationship between 
the actual week-end absenteeism and 
the average number working, it was 
felt desirable to compute the ratio of 
week-end absenteeism to the working 
force, and then to compare these ratios 
with the labor turnover. 

For example, in March, 1919, there 
was a week-end absence of 200, in 
September, 1921, a week-end absence 
of 50 (Table I). It would appear from 
these figures that the absenteeism in 
March of 1919 was four times as great 
as that of September, 1921. However, 
the working force in March, 1919, 

























120 


The Annals of the American Academy 


averaged 5,150, whereas, that in 
September averaged 3,175. A com¬ 
parison of ratios of the respective 
absenteeism indices with their working 
force bases shows that the March, 1919, 
absenteeism was only a little over twice 
as great as that in 1921 (1.6 per cent 
against 3.9 per cent). 

Because of the reasoning involved 
in the example just cited, a comparison 
of absenteeism ratios was made with 
monthly turnover (Figure 3). 

It is evident that there is here shown 
a strong tendency toward conformity 
between the two curves. Although it 
would have been quite possible to ex¬ 
press these two curves in standard 
deviation as was done in Figure 2, the 
same general effect has been obtained 
by the use of a double scale. 

The only object in analyzing the 
statistics of Company A in such a thor¬ 
ough manner has been to show that the 
actual figures of one variable (such as 
week-end absenteeism) do not necessa¬ 
rily prove or disprove any particular 
hypothesis (such as the statement that 
absenteeism had been decreased as a 
result of prohibition). Students who 
attempt to prove statistically the 
effects of prohibition in industry wall do 
well to keep in mind that there are 
many variables which enter into the 
figures they can obtain. These other 
variables should be analyzed as care¬ 
fully as that in which the student is 
primarily interested. 

The persistent statements that pro¬ 
hibition had decreased week-end absen¬ 
teeism leave little doubt that such 
has been the case. It is unfortunate 
that those who make the statements do 
not publish the figures as supporting ev¬ 
idence. The following cause of absen¬ 
teeism quoted from an article entitled 
“Absenteeism in Labor” 5 is typical: 

6 Absenteeism in Labor, Paul H. Douglas, 
Political Science Quarterly, December, 1919. 


Liquor. The influence of liquor in caus¬ 
ing absenteeism cannot be accurately 
measured. The majority of employment 
managers, however, state that from their 
observation drinking men are absent far 
more frequently than abstainers. It is also 
true that shipyards in “dry” states have 
somewhat better attendance records than 
those in “wet” states. Although the whole 
matter is one on which no absolute state¬ 
ment can be made, it seems reasonably cer¬ 
tain, all other things being equal, that com¬ 
plete prohibition will bring with it a decided 
improvement in working attendance. 

The Author’s View 

The writer has been asked to give his 
own opinion on the subject. 

Frankly I’m for it. I’m for it one 
hundred per cent. As I write, there 
come to my mind tales of drunken de¬ 
bauchery which stole the vitality from 
competent toilers. I have known 
workers who crawled out of bed at 
noon on Monday to come to work 
Tuesday. I have gone into homes of 
misery where King Alcohol and his 
consort, Poverty, held sway. 

Today, I see a great change. Men 
are happier—working harder, produc¬ 
ing more. They are better ^workmen. 
Homes are brighter—wives neater— 
children cleaner. 

There are many who want beer and 
light wines retained. They forget that 
ten drinks of low percentage alcoholic 
beverage will yield as much alcohol as 
one stronger drink. I insist that for 
the betterment of those millions of 
workers who constitute the brawn 
and sinew of our nation, the minority 
shall sacrifice its desires for beer and 
wines. 

Because I believe that men will be 
better men and that industry will be 
a better industry if alcohol is absent, 
as an employment manager and as a 
plain citizen, I’m for it. 

I’m for it one hundred per cent. 


Notes about Prohibition from the Background 

By Robert A. Woods 

Head, South End House, Boston; formerly member of the Boston Licensing Board 


O NE of the many reasons why 
prohibition has seemed to me a 
clearly indicated cause for a settlement 
worker is that it strikes right up and 
down the strata of society. The 
specific evil at which it is directed is 
no respecter of persons. Essential 
indifference to it, and to all the 
political, economic and moral damage 
associated with it, has been widespread 
among rich and poor, educated and 
ignorant. It would be hard to find a 
more truly social evil than alcoholism. 
National prohibition is looked upon 
by disinterested foreign observers as 
by far the most broadly and pro¬ 
foundly social experiment that the 
world has yet seen. 

From that point of view, the progress 
already made with the problem of its 
enforcement is very considerable. All 
enforcement of liquor legislation has 
had to meet the persistent presumption 
first, that law in general is strictly 
enforced, beginning at the moment it 
is placed on the statute books; and 
particularly, that previously existing 
liquor laws, as compared with new 
enactments, had been satisfactorily 
enforced and obeyed. It is clear 
enough, without referring to our well- 
recognized national tendency to laxity 
in obedience to law in general, that 
every law dealing with human impulse 
has represented in a real sense a goal 
to be reached rather than already 
arrived at. It has recently been 
pointed out that, while the slave trade 
was legally abolished in 1808, it was 
not entirely eliminated until slavery 
itself was abolished. If, however, the 
slave trade had not been continuously 


repressed in this way, the abolition of 
slavery would have been vastly more 
difficult. 

Good Results Can Be Secured 

As to the confident assertions of 
increase in lawbreaking and contempt 
for law under prohibition, I can give 
direct testimony out of varied ex¬ 
periences with relation to the liquor 
problem. For four years I worked, 
with others, with final success, to 
secure legislation accurately designed 
to eliminate saloon practices which 
were leading to intoxication. During 
this whole period, the entire power of 
the Massachusetts liquor trade in all 
its branches and with all its meth¬ 
ods, strongly reenforced from outside 
the state, was brought to bear to 
thwart an effort to cleanse the saloon, 
and reduce in some degree its re¬ 
sponsibility for the huge burden of 
drunkenness and related forms of law¬ 
breaking. 

A little later, I was appointed one of 
the three members of the Licensing 
Board for the city of Boston. Here 
my object was a two-fold one: to reduce 
the total of drunkenness and to drive a 
wedge between the liquor business and 
prostitution. In both directions, prac¬ 
tical measures were devised which 
demonstrated clearly that good results 
could be increasingly secured. But 
the board met the unyielding and 
practically universal opposition of the 
liquor trade at every point; and the 
two members actively interested in 
this policy were finally displaced 
through the power of certain great 
brewery interests. 


121 


122 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Evidence a Strong Ally 

This series of events, which had 
wide publicity throughout the state, 
definitely served to convince great 
numbers of people in Massachusetts, 
inclined to partial or gradual stages of 
betterment, that such measures would 
have little or no opportunity from the 
point of view either of legislation or 
enforcement; and undoubtedly served 
to bring Massachusetts forward as 
the first northeastern state to ratify 
the Prohibition Amendment. All this 
time, the total number of arrests for 
drunkenness and other offences closely 
associated with the use of liquor was 
steadily mounting. 

It is said, however, that the sale of 
liquor as at present carried on exhibits 
an out-and-out intolerable attitude 
toward all law and government. It is 
curious that this feeling with regard to 
the illicit sale of liquor should have 
become so strong since the enactment 
of prohibition. In the state of Mass¬ 
achusetts in 1910, a careful and com¬ 
prehensive study was made to find 
how many persons paying the $50 
federal revenue tax as being sellers of 
intoxicating liquors were without a 
license to sell. The total number of 
such cases was found to be 1,694, 421 
of them in licensed cities and towns. 
Here in the paradise of local option 
were all these “speak-easies, ” actually 
posting their federal tax receipts on 
their premises, prima facie evidence 
that they were flouting the license law. 
And nobody knows how many others 
there were that did not pay the United 
States tax. 

It is important to remember in this 
connection that prohibition has be¬ 
yond question secured one of the most 
important of its objects in the destruc¬ 
tion of the vast organized power of the 
liquor interests over government, mu¬ 
nicipal, state and national, and has 


thus removed the most obviously 
corrupting influence from out of Ameri¬ 
can public life. 

The most frequently expressed con¬ 
cern about prohibition and contempt 
for law seems to be felt, however, with 
relation to the attitude and actions of 
persons in the higher walks of commer¬ 
cial and professional life. Prohibition 
is accused of making good citizens 
lawbreakers. Professor Henry W. Far- 
nam, of Yale, in a recent address has 
said that the process is not that of 
making lawbreakers, but only of dis¬ 
closing them. 

Lawbreakers Seek Justification 

These persons seek justification in 
two directions. They urge that their 
personal liberty is being invaded. As 
a matter of fact, every liquor law from 
the beginning has represented an in¬ 
vasion of personal liberty. For large 
and increasing numbers of people they 
have made the use of liquor impossible. 
It is only now that these privileged 
members of the community have begun 
to experience the full meaning of such 
legislation, and they are assuming a 
certain strange moral justification for 
placing themselves outside or above the 
law. 

If it be allowed that this attitude is 
to be considered in the light of rebellion 
rather than crude outlawry, it should 
be remembered that the United States 
Courts have for eighty years recognized 
that it was always within the power 
of government to withhold all liquor 
licenses, on the ground that no man 
drank to himself. This principle has 
been steadily and variously reenforced 
by science and by the logic of experi¬ 
ence. It has reached its final con¬ 
firmation in the conclusions of labora¬ 
tory research that alcohol, even in 
small quantities, damages the germ 
cell through which the gift of life passes 
from generation to generation. This 


Prohibition from the Background 


123 


result has, beyond question, carried all 
use of alcohol beyond the range of 
personal liberty. 

Another ground on which some jus¬ 
tify themselves in the continued pur¬ 
chase of liquor is that such enactments 
as that of prohibition should not be 
included in the Constitution. It will 
be interesting to see what will become 
of this anarchic attitude toward an 
authentic part of the Constitution of 
the United States when the proposed 
Child Labor Amendment to the Con¬ 
stitution is brought forward. Will it 
be considered that the Prohibition 
Amendment in all probability cannot 
be changed, while the Child Labor 
Amendment can be prevented; and 
will the main action of the Constitu¬ 
tional Liberty Association be turned 
against it? 

It is clear enough that prohibition 
in a remarkably short time has achieved 
a very high level of success, except in a 
few great city centers, chiefly in the 
northeastern section of the country. 
In other words, its failure thus far, 
speaking broadly, lies with two ele¬ 
ments of our population: the immi¬ 
grants established in congested city 
colonies, and a fraction of the elite, to 
whom the use of alcoholic drinks has 
become not so much an inveterate 
habit as the sign and symbol of a luxu¬ 
rious “kultur.” 

Representative Type in Favor 

Over against these stands the great 
representative and typical body of the 
American people, who already to so 
large an extent regard this question as 
closed. It is not to be conceived of 
that they will change their intention 
on account of the attitude of these 
two exceptional and unrepresentative 
groups; and it will be far worse for 
them to be set off in outlaw communi¬ 
ties than to become the subjects of 
detailed federal coercion. 


The two recalcitrant groups curi¬ 
ously represent the transplanted Euro¬ 
pean political theories of the 18th 
century. The mass of the American 
people are combining the tradition of 
the Puritan commonwealth with that 
of modern social science. And let it 
be remembered that among them are 
a vast preponderance of the men of 
vision and power. To give a single 
instance, when the list of 1,000 signers 
was being made up for the petition to 
Congress in favor of national prohi¬ 
bition, so many economists from our 
colleges and universities sent in their 
names that only a fraction of them 
could be included without spoiling the 
representative character of the list. 

Increasing Difficulty in Securing 
Good Liquor 

Let it not be thought, however, that 
prohibition is failing to justify itself 
under practical tests in the large cities. 
The testimony of social workers is very 
emphatic and almost unanimous to the 
effect that great gains have been 
wrought among the people with whom 
they have to do. The only exception 
that has come to my attention is that of 
a man who recently in rather advanced 
years left the law to become the ex¬ 
ecutive of a charitable organization in 
New York. He complains that pro¬ 
hibition is corrupting the New York 
police. 

It is true, of course, that there has 
been some recession in the good results 
as the illicit trade has had time to or¬ 
ganize itself; but in the whole field 
covered by social work—including 
thirty different kinds of crime and 
misdemeanor—wherever alcohol might 
conceivably have an influence there is 
only one group of statistics that do not 
show a very substantial improvement. 
Those come from the hospitals, and are 
flourished triumphantly by the oppo¬ 
nents of prohibition as indicating that 


124 


The Annals of the American Academy 


it is actually doing liarm to the poor. 
The truth is that these figures show 
how increasingly difficult it is to get 
good liquor. Nearly all of the hospital 
cases of today would have been police 
station cases before the passage of pro¬ 
hibition laws. Now the police feel that 
the danger of collapse or even death is 
so great that they are inclined to send 
doubtful cases to the hospital as 
quickly as possible. The reports of 
private institutions caring for alcohol¬ 
ics, and making substantial charges, 
indicate that the well-to-do are in¬ 
creasingly showing the effects of dan¬ 
gerous decoctions. Prohibition en¬ 
forcement officers testify that only a 
very small proportion of the liquor 
confiscated by them is up to standard, 
and most of it is dangerous. 

Considering the relatively small 
amount of good liquor that is imported, 
the situation must soon arise where the 
violators of the law among the pros¬ 
perous will have to choose between 
abstention and grave danger to health 
and life. One man of wealth, whose 
pre-prohibition supply of liquor has 
become exhausted, now resorting to his 
bootlegger, has found it wise to have 
his chemist as well examine the contents 
of every bottle. From this point of 
view, the general atmosphere of bra¬ 
vado or even of asserted personal 
liberty which surrounds the violation 
of the prohibition law, will be very 
much less apparent. 

English Attitude 

Interesting light has been thrown 
upon the question of personal liberty 
by the attitude of two representa¬ 
tive Englishmen toward prohibition in 
America. One of them is a successful 
and public-spirited Birmingham bus¬ 
iness man. When the situation first 
came fully to his attention, he took the 
usual position that Englishmen would 
never consider such a patent infringe¬ 


ment of their personal liberty. After 
being informed that prohibition had 
the very general support of business 
men throughout the country, and 
learning of the results of a study made 
by Professor Irving Fisher, the Yale 
economist, indicating that prohibition 
would increase the total annual product 
of the United States by between 10 and 
20 per cent, he said with a sigh, “Oh 
well, if it will do that, we shall have to 
adopt it, too.” 

The other was Sir Arthur News- 
holme, one of the leading authorities in 
the world on vital statistics. After 
being in America for two years, after 
the new order came in, he told his 
countrymen that the Americans had 
adopted prohibition because they 
wished to be free of an intolerable 
slavery, and asserted that England 
must go far in the same direction if she 
wished to hold her place among the 
great nations. 

Improvement in Economic and 
Family Conditions 

The very general testimony of em¬ 
ployers, the increase of savings bank 
deposits, the prosperity of retail trade, 
and even specific statements from Wall 
Street, show, clearly that prohibition is 
bringing a very substantial increment 
of energy and resource into the channels 
of production. When I was a member 
of the Licensing Board, I figured that 
the liquor trade did an annual business 
in Boston of not less than $40,000,000. 
Allowing that the total yearly volume 
of the bootleggers’ business comes to 
one tenth of that amount, we have 
$36,000,000 added to the purchasing 
power of the people, not to mention the 
increase in their earning power through 
the very marked increase in sobriety. 

I may give a single instance to show 
how this money is being spent. In a 
section of the city where there was 
formerly a nest of fifteen or twenty 


Prohibition from the Background 


125 


saloons, there are now as many furni¬ 
ture stores, three fourths of them new 
establishments since prohibition came 
in. The whole experience of social 
agencies whose visitors are in intimate 
contact with the home life of wage 
earners shows a very marked improve¬ 
ment in all economic standards, in¬ 
cluding not only living conditions but 
provision for the future. 

It is not unlikely that the most far- 
reaching effect of prohibition has con¬ 
sisted in the recovered family instinct 
and responsibility, not merely of the 
drunkard but of saloon habitues in 
general, many of whom rarely if ever 
become intoxicated, but whose higher 
brain centers were always more or less 
alcoholized. It is the repeated and 
widespread testimony of social workers 
that the largest and best gains from 
prohibition are in the families, not of 
the whisky drinkers, but of the beer 
drinkers. What has happened to these 
men is suggested by the query as to 
what has become of all the patrons of 
the saloons. 

There was a time between the enact¬ 
ment of prohibition and the beginning 
of its enforcement when vast national 
programs were seriously proposed for 
the opening in all the cities of numer¬ 
ous so-called substitutes for the saloon. 
We saw small armies of men issuing 
forth from this so-called “working¬ 
men’s club” and demanding to be 
provided for by a resort not unlike it. 
Where are these men? The answer is 
that, to a very large and surprising 
extent, they are at home. As soon as 
they got the alcohol out of their sys¬ 
tems, they began to rediscover them¬ 
selves as domestic beings. The pro¬ 
foundly moralizing result is so wide¬ 
spread as to show its effects on the 
whole character of tenement-house 
neighborhoods. This is said without 
any desire to minimize the seriously 
demoralizing influence of the numerous 


speak-easies that flourish in all such 
quarters. The net gain is still very 
great. Not long ago, Dr. John L. 
Elliott, who has worked for twenty- 
five years in a strong Tammany ward 
in New York City, and who was not 
originally an advocate of prohibition, 
informed me that in spite of the illicit 
trade he was amazed to find the bene¬ 
fits that prohibition had wrought. 

Eloquent Testimony 

Not long ago I was present with a 
group of social workers in consultation 
with a Roman Catholic clergyman who 
has exceptional facilities for being in¬ 
formed about conditions throughout 
one of the largest and most important 
dioceses of that church. He was 
asked about the effects of prohibition. 
He replied with enthusiasm: 

Prohibition has brought great benefits 
to our people. I do not believe in the 
theory of prohibition. I do not believe 
that you can make men good by an act of 
Congress. But indeed the gains which 
prohibition has brought are so great that 
I could almost wish I might be proved 
wrong about the principle. 

This suggests that, among a great 
element of our population not previ¬ 
ously inclined to prohibition, a strong 
undercurrent is rising which cannot 
but have a marked effect in the direc¬ 
tion of more complete enforcement, 
and against any backward legislative 
step. 

The pervasive silence of organized 
labor is highly significant. Opposition 
to prohibition is occasionally voiced by 
Mr. Gompers and a few other labor 
leaders, and there are occasional 
formal demands for the relaxation of 
the Volstead law. But on the whole, 
the labor attitude must be construed 
as eloquent testimony of improved 
conditions among the rank and file, 
and of better union of finances and 
morale. In this connection, there is 


126 


The Annals of the American Academy 


reason to believe that a few labor 
leaders who are urging that under pro¬ 
hibition the'rich can have what they 
want while the poor are deprived, are 
being paid by rich officials of anti-pro¬ 
hibition organizations to spread such 
propaganda. 

The Beer Saloon 

An almost ironical aspect of the 
situation is that we are all of the anti¬ 
saloon contingent now. There is not 
even one advocate of beer and “light” 
wine that can tolerate the thought of 
the saloon’s return. Remembering 
sadly how impossible it was before 
prohibition to secure among any of 
these advocates the slightest interest 
in reducing the abominations of the 
saloon, I cannot take very seriously 
their present attitude. How beer 
could come back and not bring the 
saloon is something that an impartial 
student of the subject can with diffi¬ 
culty conceive. It was carefully ex¬ 
plained to me as a license commissioner 
that the saloon was a necessity. 
Beer, being perishable, must be kept 
on ice. The poor man cannot have 
a refrigerator. There must be the 
local depot where he can get it fresh 
for immediate consumption. The 
saloon was in fact one of the essential 
organs of democracy. 

Moreover, experience showed that 
the beer saloon, pure and simple, was 
not sufficient. The five-cent drink 
did not pay. Whisky, the ten-cent 
drink, was necessary, even from the 
brewer’s point of view if he was to 
collect his interest on the saloon keep¬ 
er’s license. Moreover, the working¬ 
man who wanted his beer, and that 
only, was largely a myth. The 
secretary of the Brewers’ Association 
informed me that the beer saloon— 
which I was officially seeking to en¬ 
courage—was impossible because prac¬ 
tically everybody that went to a 


saloon wanted both beer and whisky. 
These bits of testimony are submitted 
in the face of the advocates of a modi¬ 
fication of the Volstead law. 

These advocates urge that we should 
have beer and wine sold to men and 
women in cafes, after the so-called 
“harmless” European model. Here 
again licensing board experience may 
shed light. Under the old order in 
Boston the majority of such places 
were hardly more nor less than licensed 
market places for prostitution. The 
sale of liquor was largely incidental. 
And, be it noted, only the lighter 
alcoholic drinks were current. These 
were not places in which young men 
and women got drunk. They had 
only such measure of alcohol as would 
blur the better sensibilities and spur 
the worse. Beer and light wine would 
amply suffice to bring back these open 
abominations in our cities. It had 
become increasingly common to have 
dancing in such places. Beer and 
wine would bring back this ominous 
combination. 

We should remember, perhaps above 
all, that a modified Volstead Act would 
restore the political power of the brew¬ 
ers to erect every sort of powerful 
intrenchment about these evil resorts, 
and to corrupt every branch of the 
public service in the process. 

Defiance of- the Law Dangerous 
Factor 

It cannot be thought that the Amer¬ 
ican people, in order to satisfy a small 
irreconcilable minority, will think of 
incurring any such risks. The pos¬ 
sibility of repealing the Eighteenth 
Amendment is admittedly microscopic. 
The Volstead Act is as solidly secure 
under the incoming radical Congress 
as under the outgoing conservative 
one. The attitude of the Supreme 
Court toward an effort to legalize alco¬ 
holic drinks under the Eighteenth 


Prohibition from the Background 


127 


Amendment is suggested by the words 
of Mr. Taft shortly before he was 
appointed Chief Justice: 1 “Any such 
loophole as beers and wines would 
make the Amendment a laughing 
stock.” And his address before the 
Yale Alumni in June of this year 
served to emphasize this position. 
The propaganda which would consider 
a change in this law as within the 
range of practical politics is hardly 
creditable to the intelligence of its 
proponents, if that is what they really 
propose. It looks, and will look in¬ 
creasingly, as if this attitude was 
taken as a means of self-justification 
for the gratification of appetite through 
the violation of the law. In the mean¬ 
time, considering that the great burden 
of the enforcement of this constitu¬ 
tional and congressional legislation is 
found among our recent immigrant 
population, our citizens of American 
antecedents who are breaking the law 
are today the most dangerous single 
factor in blocking and baffling the 
process of Americanization. 

The Law Triumphant 

An American citizen who should 
have said that his Government was not 
equal to achieving the vast untried 
tasks involved in entering the Euro¬ 
pean war w r ould have been considered 
almost in the light of a traitor. There 
is far less doubt that the Government 
will in due time, to all intents and 
purposes, solve the problem of pro¬ 
hibition enforcement. 

Let us be quite specific. The fed¬ 
eral Government will ere long solve 
the problem of patrolling the coasts so 
as very largely to prevent smuggling 
from the sea. All approaches from 
Canada can be and will be effectively 
guarded. The manufacture and dis¬ 
tribution of liquor on any considerable 
scale can within a few years be reduced 

1 Chicago Tribune , May 13 , 1922 . 


to a minimum, and in the meantime 
supplies held over from pre-prohibition 
days will be exhausted. The retail 
purchaser as well as the retail seller of 
liquor will more surely be brought 
within the reach of the law. The 
bootlegger, more and more recognized 
by public sentiment as the dispenser 
of poisoned drinks, will receive less 
consideration on the part of juries. 
Judges will more and more give jail 
sentences and cumulative ones. The 
premises used for illicit business will 
be closed under injunction for con¬ 
siderable periods. Extreme victims 
will pass off the scene; new ones will 
begin less and less to take their places 
—“Hooch” will not serve as the sub¬ 
ject of bravado and endless conversa¬ 
tion. 

The American people are not going 
to be beaten in this matter. It is, 
above all, exceedingly unsafe for more 
or less powerful elements in our great 
cities to put those cities in an attitude 
of defiance to the will of the nation as 
a whole. Along with a strong reaction 
against the economic domination of 
the great centers, there is a rising 
feeling, particularly with regard to 
New York, that it is disseminating 
throughout the country a corrupting 
influence through many of its books, 
magazines, theatrical shows, moving 
pictures, which will not be continu¬ 
ously endured. To intimate to the 
solid, characteristically American ma¬ 
jority of the nation, that its repudi¬ 
ation of alcoholic drinks must be quali¬ 
fied to suit a few of the large cities, and 
particularly in order to meet the de¬ 
sire of the luxurious society of those 
cities, is a suggestion so intolerable 
and so likely to bring a destructive 
recoil that one is amazed at the hardi¬ 
hood of those who offer it. 

Let it be admitted that constitu¬ 
tional prohibition is not in accord with 
the political philosophy which was 


128 


The Annals of the American Academy 


originally embodied in our funda¬ 
mental articles of government. It 
lias, however, itself been embodied in 
those articles. If it is not in harmony 
with the French tradition of the 18th 
century, it is in accord with that of the 
Puritan Commonwealth. It also ex¬ 
presses unequivocally the social phi¬ 
losophy of today. 

Along with the root-and-branch 
attack on alcoholism, the American 
people have undertaken, at the same 
time and in close relation with it, 
another radical reform in ending the 
policy of compromise with the closely 
related evil of prostitution. The de¬ 
crease in offences against chastity and 
in venereal disease which have resulted 
from this momentous two-fold advance 
of American civilization are alone 
enough to insure its historic justifica¬ 
tion, President Eliot, our wisest 
counsellor, for a decade past has been 
warning us with solemn reiteration, 
“If the white race does not kill alco¬ 
holism and venereal disease, they will 
kill it.” 

The “Third American Revolution” 

This opens out the perspective in 
which sporadic opposition to prohibi¬ 


tion, whether born of theory or habit 
or both combined, will assume its prop¬ 
er insignificance. A familiar Scrip¬ 
ture passage reminds us that a person 
may be a good meteorologist and poor 
interpreter of the signs of the times. 
It has always been difficult at different 
past epochs for not a few highly intel¬ 
ligent people to adapt themselves to 
historic changes. Senator Lodge in his 
History of Boston tells us that, when the 
American Revolution came on, all the 
first citizens of Boston, with the ex¬ 
ception of John Hancock, were num¬ 
bered among the Tories, and soon took 
up a baffled exile in the British prov¬ 
inces. In New York the situation 
was the same. When the Civil War 
came on, it failed to elicit the sympathy 
of many highly educated and prosper¬ 
ous citizens, certainly so far as its 
humanitarian aspect was concerned. 
The Solicitor-General of the United 
States in a recent argument before the 
Supreme Court referred to prohibition 
as the “third American Revolution.” 
It was to be expected that it would 
find many recalcitrants from among 
the same general types of people 
as were out of line with the other 
two. 


Comments on Prohibition by a Lumberman and 

Miner 

By T. D. Stiles 

Editor, Penn Central News 


T he merits or evils of prohibition 
should be measured by the effect 
upon the lives of the people. To 
consider the subject in an abstract 
sense might add something to aca¬ 
demic knowledge, but will neither 
approve or disapprove of the actual 
effect of prohibition in its present 
state of imperfect enforcement. This 
article will not attempt to deal with 
the subject other than from a layman’s 
point of view. It will give some of the 
observations of one who has spent 
forty years living with lumbermen and 
miners. 

Lumbermen and Miners 

Many consider these classes habitual 
drinkers with a large proportion ha¬ 
bitual drunkards. First, I wish to 
correct this impression. The lumber¬ 
men, even in the earlier days, were 
periodic drinkers. The greater part 
of their lives were passed in forests, 
far from the saloon. Intoxicating 
liquor of any kind was seldom per¬ 
mitted in the lumber camps which 
housed the workers. The manage¬ 
ment prohibited it. And this was the 
writer’s first experience with pro¬ 
hibition. The management generally 
prohibited intoxicating liquors for 
business, more than for moral, reasons. 
A little cheap whisky would cause 
more fights and less work in a lumber 
camp than any other one thing. The 
woodsmen did most of their drinking 
on pay days. In the earlier days, pay 
days were six months apart. So the 
average lumberman was forced to be 
content with two drunks per year. 
This drunk usually lasted as long as 


his money. Then he returned to the 
woods to recuperate and earn another 
stake. 

With the common use of sawmills, 
monthly pay days were adopted. 
This meant more drunks of shorter 
duration. Few of the lumbermen 
had an unrestrainable appetite for 
liquor. They could work for months 
without a drink. It was a relaxation 
from their arduous toil, ‘‘the woodsmen 
usually working from twelve to four¬ 
teen hours per day and in all kinds of 
inclement weather,” and it was the 
desire for relaxation and social enjoy¬ 
ment that caused the average lumber¬ 
man to drink. True, there was a 
small percentage of these people who 
were drunkards, but the open-air life 
and the strenuous exercise, made 
necessary by the nature of the work, 
did not encourage the use of stimulants. 

With the miners, we have a very 
cosmopolitan type. The native Amer¬ 
ican miners were usually ex-lumbermen. 
Their appetite for liquor seemed to 
increase with their proximity to the 
saloon. A saloon was usually one of 
the first things established in a mining 
camp. The change of occupation 
from the open air of the woods, with 
long hours of toil, to the foul, gaseous 
air of the mine and irregularity of 
employment, did much to encourage 
the habit of drink among these ex¬ 
lumbermen. Most of the Scotch and 
English miners had learned to drink 
in Europe. The Slavic race had 
been accustomed to mild forms of 
alcoholic liquor as a part of their daily 
diet, and continued the practice of 
drinking large quantities of beer. 


10 


129 


ISO 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Nevertheless, we find the habit largely 
a periodic one among the miners, 
regulated greatly by the frequency 
of pay days. To illustrate: At a 
miners’ meeting, just previous to the 
adoption of a semi-monthly pay, a 
miner objected to it, giving as his 
reason, that it meant two drunks per 
month instead of one. 

The Closed Bar and Its Effect 

With this background for the 
causes of drink, I will give some of the 
effects of prohibition as it is now en¬ 
forced. The first noticeable effect is 
the breaking up of the old social 
habits. In the days when King 
Barleycorn was free, the saloon was 
the center of social activities. The 
workers, after finishing their day’s 
work, or on idle days, usually gathered 
in the saloons. There were but few 
means for recreation in those small 
towns, and the saloon provided a 
place to meet, loaf and discuss affairs. 
Few men went to the saloon with the 
intention of getting drunk. They 
went there to meet other people and 
to learn the community news. A 
sense of sociability caused them to 
drink a few glasses. The intemperate 
usually went to excess. On pay day, 
almost everybody gathered at the 
saloon. Some of them spent a few 
dollars. Others stayed at the bar as 
long as they had a cent. Prohibition 
closed these bars, and one of the most 
striking spectacles to one who is famil¬ 
iar with the mining districts is the 
deserted appearance of the saloon in 
the mining town that, in former days, 
was the most thronged place in the 
town. 

The social effect of the closing of the 
bars was first felt in the home. As a 
rule, the workers spent at home much 
of the time that they previously 
passed in the saloon. The moving 
picture theatres, fraternal orders and 


labor union meetings are better 
attended. It is but reasonable to 
conclude from this that the family 
relations were at least, in a measure, 
improved. Another effect was the 
increased steadiness of employment. 
When the saloon existed, there was 
more drunkenness — notwithstanding 
any statements to the contrary by the 
liquor advocates. Drunk today usu¬ 
ally meant not working tomorrow. 
It took a day or two to “taper off.” 
There is but little doubt that it also 
lessened accidents to workmen and, in 
some degree, improved the quality of 
their work. 

Awakened Powers for Thought 

Prohibition has also had a benefi¬ 
cial effect upon the workers in an 
educational sense. There is no doubt 
that it has increased the regularity of 
attendance at school, and it has also 
done much to lessen the humiliation 
of children obliged to attend school 
with clothes not up to the standards 
of the community. The drunkard’s 
child is becoming conspicuous by his 
absence. But a more immediate and 
probably greater effect is plainly 
noticeable at any kind of a meeting 
where workers gather in large num¬ 
bers for discussion. This applies to 
labor unions and mass meetings. 
When the saloon was common, a mass 
meeting of workers without several 
drunks being present was a rarity. 
Oftentimes booze ruled the meeting. 
Since the enactment of the Volstead 
Act, the writer has not attended a 
single meeting that was noticeably 
disturbed by intoxicated persons pres¬ 
ent. Now, almost without excep¬ 
tion, when workers meet to discuss 
their affairs, the meetings are more 
largely attended and all are sober. 
This fact is largely responsible for the 
new awakening of thought in the 
ranks of labor. 




Comments on Prohibition 


131 


In the earlier days liquor was often 
a very potent influence in strikes. 
Strikes have been broken by the free 
uses of liquor, and strikes were always 
more or less handicapped by its use. 
Many labor leaders attributed the 
success of the recent miners’ national 
strike to prohibition. There is no 
doubt that it was one of the principle 
factors in maintaining law and order. 
Strikers are usually peaceful, law- 
abiding citizens, and, when not under 
the influence of drink, seldom resort to 
force or crime in their industrial 
struggles. The removal of a social 
center from the saloons to the home 
and labor council rooms has done 
much to encourage thrift and co¬ 
operative works. It has enabled labor 
to exercise more fully its versatile 
energy which was formally dissipated. 

A Temperate Group 

Liquor advocates contend vocif¬ 
erously that the workers are strongly 
opposed to prohibition. Never was a 
more malicious untruth propagated. 
The workers are naturally temperate. 
Their minds are generally occupied, if 
not progressively developed. Most 
occupations require physical exertion. 
These two things do not produce in¬ 
temperance. It is true that men 
engaged in an exhaustive physical 
work will sometimes resort to stim¬ 
ulants. They are laboring under the 
mistaken belief that stimulation adds 
to their power of endurance. How¬ 
ever, owing to the power of labor 
unions and the increasing number of 
sympathetic employers, as well as im¬ 
proved working conditions, the great 
majority of the workers are not obliged 
to labor to the point of physical ex¬ 
haustion. 

Personal Liberty Belief 

But few men want to become drunk¬ 
ards. Many do like to have a drink 


of wine, beer or something stronger, 
and these feel that prohibition deprives 
them of their personal liberty in this 
respect. Much of this personal lib¬ 
erty belief is the fruit of political prop¬ 
aganda, and it is strengthened by the 
fact that the wealthy and those who 
are in power are permitted to wink at 
prohibition. The feeling that men of 
ordinary means are being discrimi¬ 
nated against arouses more condem¬ 
nation than any actual desire for per¬ 
sonal liberty in this respect. There 
are exceptions, of course. 

Many parents teach their children 
to drink intoxicating liquor, and this 
class is unalterably opposed to pro¬ 
hibition. Prohibition makes this cus¬ 
tom almost impossible. A certain 
amount of secrecy is necessary to avoid 
detection. Prohibition places all the 
prestige of the law in favor of temper¬ 
ance. The fact that a large percentage 
of people drink to an excess, because 
they are unwilling to resist the tempta¬ 
tion, has long been obvious. Not 
possessing the moral will necessary to 
resist the influences surrounding drink, 
they yield. But when the stamp of 
public disapproval is, by the enact¬ 
ment of law, placed on drink, it re¬ 
moves most of the pernicious influences 
and does much to strengthen the pow¬ 
ers of resistance. 

When Politics Held Sway 

It also does much to destroy the 
power of liquor in politics. The power 
exercised in the past in this way is be¬ 
yond question. And not even the 
strongest advocate of the liquor inter¬ 
ests will contend that it worked for the 
good of the state. True, at the pres¬ 
ent time, these liquor interests cater 
to labor for political support. They 
must now fight for that which, in the 
past, they purchased like a mercantile 
commodity. One of their most effec¬ 
tive arguments is one, to which, un- 


132 


The Annals of the American Academy 


happily, labor is giving a listening ear. 
This is the argument that liquor is 
friendly to the interest of labor in 
legislative matters. Such arguments 
can be instantly exploded by labor 
by the asking of a single question: 
“What did the liquor interests do for 
labor when they dominated all legis¬ 
lative and judiciary branches of our 
Government?” Labor will not long be 
fooled, and, once it learns that its true 
interests lie with prohibition instead 
of with the liquor interests, all its 
political opposition to prohibition will 
end. 

Obstacles 

It is said that “prohibition does not 
prohibit.” There is no denying that 
prohibition is not 100 per cent en¬ 
forced. Neither are laws that have 
stood upon the statutes of men, since 
Moses received the Ten Command¬ 
ments. That prohibition is not fully 
efficient would be more nearly correct.» 
It might be well for us to examine some 
of the reasons why prohibition is not 
more efficient. In the mining dis¬ 
tricts, one of the greatest obstacles in 
the way of the enforcement of pro¬ 
hibition is what is known as the 
company town. In these towns the 
operating coal company owns, in fee 
simple, all of the real estate and has a 
chattel mortgage on the souls of their 
employees. There are a few excep¬ 
tions, where companies have made 
some effort to develop community 
life. But in most instances the lives 
of the workers and their families are 
lives of deadly routine. There is 
nothing to provide mental recreation 
or amusement. This leaves the mind 
in a favorable state for excesses of any 


kind, of which drink is the most com¬ 
mon. 

Lack of employment or irregularity 
of employment is another reason. 
When a man is out of a job, or working 
irregularly, he is more apt to become a 
customer for the bootlegger. Politi¬ 
cal trickery of the lowest order also 
seriously interferes w r ith enforcement. 
And, to our shame, it may be truth¬ 
fully said that such trickery is often 
practiced by men occupying high 
positions of trust and honor. Candi¬ 
dates for office, secretly supported by 
bootlegging interests, either do not 
commit themselves upon the question 
of prohibition, or brazenly declare 
themselves in its favor. After they 
are in office they use every means in 
their power to defeat enforcement. 
It is the secret influence of liquor 
that still seriously affects our public life. 

Ultimate Downfall 

Prohibition will follow the same 
path as other great reforms. It must 
fight to establish itself. And to me 
the most decisive argument in favor 
of its ultimate success is found in the 
actions of men collectively. There is 
no doubt that many men individually 
would like to see liquor run freely 
again, but these same men, when act¬ 
ing collectively in a political party, 
labor organization or a fraternal 
organization, emphatically refuse to 
place the stamp of approval upon any 
liquor program. The exceptions to 
this rule are few, and it is collective, 
and not individual, action that will 
decide the issue. For these reasons 
I feel satisfied that, within a few years, 
labor will be almost a unit against 
John Barleycorn. 


* 


Kansas and Its Prohibition Enforcement 

By Alfred G. Hill 

Alumni Secretary, University of Kansas; formerly of Topeka Daily Capital and Philadelphia Public 

Ledger 


W HEN federal prohibition was 
put into effect, it was generally 
admitted that the enforcement of state 
prohibition was more effective in Kan¬ 
sas than in any other state. For 
nearly forty years Kansas had been 
making a steady advance in the effi¬ 
ciency of its enforcement. Successive 
legislatures had enacted laws which 
were increasingly drastic. The right 
of drug stores to handle alcoholic stock 
was taken away. Court officers were 
given inquisition powers which made it 
possible to obtain convicting evidence. 
Repeated violation of liquor laws was 
made cause for penitentiary sentence. 
The climax came with the passage of 
the “bone dry” act which made mere 
possession of intoxicating liquor prirna 
facie evidence of violation of the Kan¬ 
sas liquor statute. 

The steps to strengthen prohibition 
during four decades were backed by a 
growing public sentiment. Long ago, 
political parties ceased to make an 
issue on the question. An anti-pro¬ 
hibition platform assured defeat. 

However, it would be ridiculous to 
say that violations of prohibitory law 
did not occur. For years it was impos¬ 
sible to combat importation of liquor 
from neighboring “wet” states because 
of the protection given railroad ship¬ 
ments. There were cities, particularly 
along the Missouri border, where prohi¬ 
bition enforcement meant a continual 
battle between law and law violator. 

To the Kansan there is startling 
similarity, in the present problem of the 
federal authorities in enforcing the 
Volstead Act, to the Kansas problem of 
twenty, thirty and forty years ago. 
Better enforcement walked almost in 
exact step with public sentiment. 


Always prohibition gained, although 
the battle was a long one. The Kan¬ 
san believes the state’s pioneer ex¬ 
perience will be repeated by the federal 
Government. He does not doubt the 
sure result for an instant. The Kansas 
battle with the liquor importation prob¬ 
lem is different only in its physical as¬ 
pects from the United States issue with 
foreign countries on the same question. 

Paradoxical Effect at First 
Inception 

When federal prohibition came, the 
Kansas problem changed. To quote a 
prominent enforcement official: 

People have discovered that “bottled 
in the barn” carries an exceptionally 
high percentage of headache and other more 
serious maladies. An analysis of some of 
the so-called bonded liquor has disclosed a 
percentage of ether and chloroform. Moon¬ 
shine whisky contains a great amount of 
poison, especially fusil oil. There is 
practically no genuine liquor being boot¬ 
legged into Kansas now. 

The appearance of a dangerous 
brand of home-prepared corn-whisky 
gave rise to the statement that federal 
prohibition, which resulted in substi¬ 
tuting manufacture for importation, 
really increased consumption of intox¬ 
icants in Kansas. 

It is a safe assertion that this was not 
the case at any time, even during the 
first few months when law enforcement 
officials were not prepared to cope with 
a new kind of problem. On the other 
hand, there was more evidence of the 
difficulty of enforcement and much 
more newspaper comment. 

Before and After 

Meanwhile, the past few years and 
months have enabled both Kansas and 


133 



134 


The Annals of the American Academy 


federal authorities to become adjusted 
to their changed problem. When the 
first federal prohibition enforcement 
officer was appointed for Kansas, the 
announcement was greeted lightly. 
“What does Kansas want with one? 
We Jayhawkers can handle prohibition 
ourselves,” was the comment heard. 
Now it is realized that the combination 
of the two forces is a strength-giving 
factor. Liquor consumption is smaller 
than ever before in Kansas. One 
federal authority questioned by the 
writer makes the following informal 
statement: 

In the old days before the Volstead Act 
there was more hard liquor consumed in 
any town in Kansas in one week than is 
consumed now in one month. The people 
who drank liquor and kept liquor then, 
drank it in greater quantities, but there 
was not so much fuss made about it. 

One drunken man will attract more 
attention on the street today than a dozen 
did ten years ago. When a man who was 
in the habit of drinking could go to Kansas 
City, Joplin, St. Joseph, or any place across 
the border and obtain liquor, it was easy to 
keep a stock. When the supply was cut 
off there developed all over the state 
amateur distilleries ranging from a five- 
gallon milk can to a genuine copper still 
and coil. The makers of home brew sprang 
up like mushrooms. Passengers in smok¬ 
ing car compartments and devotees of 
pink tea parties regaled each other with 
exchanging recipes for making everything 
from Holland Gin to the best Bourbon and 
something that would beat the old favorite 
brand of beer just as in other states. 

It was a sort of a psychological reaction. 
However, that has changed materially in 
the past twelve or eighteen months. Too 
many people have found the beverage they 
and the other fellow made is flat. It may 
contain a “kick,” but the reaction is 
bad. 

The Minimum Reached 

The latter statement calls attention 
to an enforcement which Kansas has in 
comparison to states near the seaboard 


or Canada or Mexico. The risks to 
automobile runners or any other kind 
of bootleggers in transporting liquor to 
Kansas is so great as to make it practi¬ 
cally a certainty that bonded and aged 
intoxicants smuggled into this country 
do not reach so far inland. 

To quote futher from the authority 
who probably is best acquainted with 
the Kansas situation: 

When Kansas was an island entirely 
surrounded by liquid territory, a still was 
never heard of or known. In fact, we had 
no statute against the ownership of stills 
until one was enacted by the last legislature. 
The Eighteenth Amendment temporarily 
made Kansas “wet” as far as manufacturing 
was concerned. 

Police records confirm the statement 
that the effects of liquor have reached 
the minimum of Kansas history. Ar¬ 
rests for drunkenness are only a fraction 
of the total, even of a few years ago. 
Futher evidence in the lessened amount 
of liquor consumption is that the legit¬ 
imate withdrawals of alcohol in Kan¬ 
sas have been voluntarily reduced by 
the permittees almost 50 per cent in the 
last eighteen months. 

Present Drastic Laws 

At the present time, the Kansas 
state laws for prohibition enforcement 
are as drastic and comprehensive as the 
ability of the state’s legislators can 
make them. No new measure offi¬ 
cially sponsored, which aimed to 
strengthen the enforcement, has been 
refused by a Kansas legislature in more 
than a decade. The ease with which 
convictions are obtained, the provision 
by which automobiles used in trans¬ 
porting liquor may be confiscated, and 
the penitentiary as well as financial 
punishments, are factors which make 
liquor violation efforts unpopular on the 
part of men whose evasion might be 
formidable. Sentiment on the part of 
Kansas people is so strongly against 


Kansas and Its Prohibition Enforcement 


135 


liquor violation that it is simple for 
county officials to obtain convictions 
where they have the evidence. The 
present attorney general has continued 
in force an aggressive policy against 
any officials who are derelict in pro¬ 
hibitory law enforcement, and there are 
occasional ouster suits which either 
bring the official to time or result in his 
removal. 

During the past three months, stills 
have been seized frequently by author¬ 
ities, and the federal prohibition officer 
has recommended the assessment of 
more than $300,000 as government 
taxes. This financial punishment is in 
addition to the state penalties, which 
are so effective that the federal author¬ 
ities chose to operate in liquor cases 
under state laws. 

Foreigner Chief Violator 

The Kansas problem of prohibitory 
enforcement is not complicated as in 


large cities by the foreign element, 
Kansas is primarily rural in its popula¬ 
tion. It has only one city barely over 
the 100,000 population mark and a 
decidedly small portion of its popula¬ 
tion is foreign born. Even in Kansas, 
however, a large per cent of the viola¬ 
tors, especially the manufacturers of 
moonshine liquor, are foreigners. 

During recent months, while the 
writer has visited in a number of large 
cities in the eastern half of the United 
States, he has been surprised at the 
amount of discussion concerning pro¬ 
hibition and its enforcement. Evi¬ 
dence of illegal sale of liquor and its 
discussion were both much more no¬ 
ticeable than in Kansas. The expla¬ 
nation probably may be found in the 
fact that Kansas, with its four decades 
of experience in prohibition, regards the 
matter as settled. It is rather a shock 
to find outside the bounds of the state 
so much of a furore. 


Footnote: The following letter from Dr. 
M. L. Perry, President of the Kansas 
Medical Society, and Superintendent of the 
State Hospital for the Insane at Topeka, 
Kansas, is of peculiar interest in showing 
the decrease in the number of patients in 
that hospital whose insanity was due to the 
use of alcohol: 

Dear Mr. Hill: 

Your letter of the 23rd ult. has been re¬ 
ceived. I am very glad to give you such 


information as I can regarding the influ¬ 
ence of alcohol as a causative factor in the 
production of insanity as shown by our 
records. The figures given below are taken 
from some recent biennial reports. 

Our tables for the fiscal year 1923, which 
closes June 30, 1923, have not yet been 
prepared, but to the best of my judgment 
the percentage will run about the same as 
for the last few years. 

From the above figures you will note 
that we have a very low percentage of 


Year 

No. Patients 
Admitted 

No. Showing 
Alcoholic History in 
Commitment Papers 

No. Showing Alcoholic 
Psychoses as Diagnosed 
by Hospital Staff 

1915. 

385 

11 or 2.9% 

7 or 1.8% 

1916. 

410 

12 “ 22.9% 

8 “ 1.9% 

1917. 

359 

17 “ 4.7% 

8 “ 2.2% 

1918. 

373 

25 “ 6.7% 

1 “ .27% 

1919. 

333 

12 “ 3.6% 

7 “ 2.1% 

1920. 

384 

13 “ 3.3% 

7 “ 1.8% 

1921. 

339 

1 “ .3% 

2 “ .6% 

1922. 

341 

5 “ 1.4% 

5 “ 1.4% 























136 


The Annals of the American Academy 


alcoholic psychoses in this state. There 
has been a good deal of difficulty in the past 
in getting anything like a satisfactory 
comparison of institutional statistics in 
different states, for the reason that cases 
were studied closer in some states than 
others and there was frequently a different 
classification used. In the last few years, 
however, practically all state institutions 
have adopted the same classification, which 
is that endorsed by the American Psychiat¬ 
ric Association. 

My personal opinion, based on nearly 
thirty years’ experience, including services 
in state hospitals in three different states, 
is that prohibition has very materially re¬ 
duced the number of alcoholic psychoses. 
It appears to be true that, directly follow¬ 
ing the adoption of national prohibition, 
there was a decided increase in the number 
of family stills for making hootch. That 
does not seem to have had any material 


influence on the number of people develop¬ 
ing alcoholic psychoses, nor, in fact, on the 
number of insane committed with a history 
of alcohol as a possible causative factor of 
their mental trouble. The private still in 
my judgment was largely a matter of a fad 
and is rapidly passing. 

For your information I will say that I 
used to be opposed to prohibition, but my 
observation of the effects of the law, as 
observed for the last ten or twelve years in 
Kansas, has convinced me that prohibition 
can be made to practically prohibit and is 
an excellent thing for the people and the 
country. I am in no sense a rabid or a 
fanatical prohibitionist, however, and the 
conclusions cited above from our statistics 
and my observation are, I believe, conserv¬ 
ative. 

Yours very truly, 

M. L. Perry, 

Superintendent, Topeka State Hospital. 



I 


The Consumption of Alcoholic Beverages 


By Hugh F. Fox 

Secretary, United States Brewers Association 


I N an optimistic statement issued to 
the press on May 28, 1923 by Pro¬ 
hibition Commissioner Haynes, he 
claims that if the entire amount of the 
exports of spirits from the United 
Kingdom, the West Indies and Canada 
for 1923 were smuggled into the United 
States, the total would only be about 
one and one-quarter per cent of the 
liquor consumed in the fiscal year 1913. 
The statement was evidently made to 
show the progress made in drying 
up the country. The Commissioner 
qualifies this with a statement that: 
“There is less occasion to worry over 
the rum fleet smugglers than over the 
domestic concoctions of fraudulent 
spirits.” 

Moonshine Whisky 

Nobody knows how much moon¬ 
shine whisky is being made. Before 
national prohibition, moonshining was 
quite common in the 'dachian 

Mountains, but it was a . Hair 

of local bartering between dibors. 

It has now become an organ ^ffic, 
which is quite common in eve don 
of the country. Day by day ti ers 
tell stories of the explosions of s in 
tenement houses; and they say ti the 
low price of grain has tempted many of 
the farmers in the grain states to make 
whisky. 

The evil of home distilling has 
manifested itself in all the countries of 
northern Europe which adopted re¬ 
strictive measures. Sober communi¬ 
ties in the northern part of France, in 
Switzerland and in the Scandinavian 
countries have become notoriously 
drunken as the result of driving the 
manufacture of liquor into the homes 


of the people. There is no doubt what¬ 
ever that millions of families in the 
United States are now making their 
own alcoholic beverages, and it is 
certain that this practice is one which 
will bear sinister results long after the 
national prohibition act has been 
modified. 

The reported increase in 1923 of 
about a thousand per cent in the sale of 
corn sugar, is significant. Corn sugar 
is easily fermentable; it requires no 
“mashing” or grinding and it is cheap. 
Detroit is now using a hundred cars 
a month of 40,000 pounds to a car. 
Bethlehem, Johnstown, Scranton, 
Allegheny and other Pennsylvania 
cities are using about the same quanti¬ 
ty, and Newark, New Jersey, buys 
about five times as much. 

While corn sugar has its legitimate 
uses for baking, tanning, vinegar, etc., 
these requirements are only about 10 
per cent of the present production. 
The other 90 per cent is credited in 
trade circles to “hootch”. 

Cider 

Next in importance to moonshining 
in country districts is the cider business. 
For some good reason, no doubt, Con¬ 
gress and the prohibition authorities 
have been very tender with the farmer, 
who has been given a special dispensa¬ 
tion with respect to cider. Sweet 
cider containing less than one half of 
one per cent of alcohol by volume may 
be manufactured and sold without the 
necessity of obtaining a permit. It is 
true that the responsibility of keeping 
the alcoholic content below such per¬ 
centage rests upon the manufacturer, 
but this only applies when it is marketed 




138 


The Annals of the American Academy 


for profit; and there are few if any 
cases on record of any interference with 
the farmer in the sale of his cider. 

As a matter of fact, there are thou¬ 
sands of small towns and villages 
throughout the country where the 
entire inhabitants have never seen a 
prohibition enforcement officer, and 
appear to be immune from interference. 

On pleasant autumn days the high¬ 
roads in the apple districts are dotted 
every mile or two with little “stands” 
where home-made cider is offered for 
sale to the thirsty wayfarer. 

In an old almanac issued by the 
Massachusetts Temperance Union for 
“the year of our Lord 1841,” there is a 
passionate appeal to farmers to “pull 
down your cider mill; turn your old 
casks into steamers and fuel; cook your 
apples for your swine and feed them to 
your cattle.” The almanac says: 
“Cider is emphatically our national 
intoxicating beverage.” 

Home-Brewed Beer 

It is probable that home brewing of 
beer has been overestimated. The 
only basis for determining it is the 
amount of hops which have been put 
up in small packages. The hops after 
they are harvested and cured are com¬ 
pressed in bales of about 200 pounds. 
A pound of hops will make a barrel of 
31 gallons of beer. Hop merchants 
report that in 1922 about 50,000 bales 
of hops were cut up for sale in small 
packages. This would be enough to 
make 248,000,000 gallons of beer, or 
8,000,000 barrels. The amount of 
beer made and sold by brewers in 1914 
reached a total of 66,000,000 barrels. 
Home brewing in the family is probably 
decreasing because it involves a cook¬ 
ing operation which is troublesome 
and messy, and not very successful. 
It is impossible to turn out a light, 
palatable and wholesome brew without 
the use of highly specialized and costly 



apparatus and facilities for sterilizin 
filtering and refrigeration. The home 
beers are, at their best, a poor imitation 
of old-fashioned stock ales, which con¬ 
tain at least twice as much alcohol as 
the lager beer of commerce. A good 
many saloon keepers are said to be 
making beer for their own trade, but 
on the whole, I think that the home¬ 
brewing phase of the problem is of 
minor importance. 

Home Wine Making 

When it comes to home wine making 
there is a very different story to tell. 
Home brewing and home distilling are 
illegal, but home wine making is per¬ 
mitted by the Government through a 
significant “catch” in the regulations 
of the Prohibition Enforcement De¬ 
partment. Individuals are expressly 
permitted to make 200 gallons a yea ’ 
of “non-intoxicating fruit juices” fo 
their own use, with the definite proviso 
t l, at in relation to these non-intoxicat¬ 
ing fruit juices the question of what is 
intoxicating is one of fact, without 
any limitation as to the percentage of 
alcohol they may contain. These 
wines probably average 
cent of alcohol, but if 
y intoxication resulting 
ise, it is a domestic affair 
. not find its way into the 
jrds. 

enormous increase in home 
wJj iking is due to its simplicity, 

, j the ease with which the raw 
m« erials can be obtained. It does 
not require any cooking operation or 
special apparatus. A number of the 
enterprising wineries are now putting 
up a concentrated grape extract in 
gallon cans, which are guaranteed to 
keep indefinitely under any condi¬ 
tions. All you have to do is to add 
3 or 4 parts of water, let it ferment 
naturally, and then put it in a cool 
place until it becomes a palatable 


a \ 
the J 
from •' 
whi*^ 

P 



Consumption of Alcoholic Beverages 


139 


{ 

ion-intoxicating fruit juice.” Some 
measure of the volume of home wine 
making may be obtained ^from the 
carload shipments of grapes. In 1922 
California shipped overland 420,000 
tons of wine grapes, and 240,000 tons 
of table grapes. 

According to the California Depart¬ 
ment of Agriculture, all varieties of 
grapes are being converted into juice 
for “home brewing.” The carload 
shipments from New York, Michigan 
and Pennsylvania in 1922 totaled 14,- 
831 cars, which is equivalent to 185,- 
367 tons. These four states alone, 
therefore, shipped 845,587 tons of 
grapes. The amount of juice which 
a ton of grapes yields, varies from 90 
to 180 gallons. Taking 150 gallons 
to the ton as our unit of measure¬ 
ment, we get a total of 126,808,050 
jc^allons. 

Increased Activity Among Farmers 
and Market Gardeners 

*‘XJ 

However, these transportation Lg- 
ures only cover the bulk shipments in 
carload lots, and take no account r of 
the very large volume of business done 
by small farmers and market garden¬ 
ers in basket deliveries. So far thece 
has been no limit to the demand for 
grapes, but there are serious problems 
for the grape growers to consider 
in the future. The California Stpde 
Agricultural Statistician reports that 
about 100,000 tons of the 1922 gra;pe 
crop were left on the vines because, of 
the impossibility of obtaining en; gh 
refrigerator cars. The 1923 crop will 
require at least 60,000 cars, and fruit 
growers in Oregon and other western 
states are complaining because of the 
diversion of refrigerator cars to the 
grape districts. The manager of the 
Oregon Apple Company says: 

I am informed that before national prohi¬ 
bition became effective the price of wine 
grapes in California ran from $7 to $15 a 


ton. The f. o. b. price the past season was 
as high as $200 a ton. Probably no agri¬ 
cultural activity in the United States ever 
showed such tremendous profits as has the 
growing of wine grapes since the passage of 
the Volstead Act. . . . New wine 

grape plantings are increasing all over the 
country by the thousands of acres. 

This is borne out by official reports 
from many different sections of the 
country. The grape acreage in bear¬ 
ing in California in 1922, which in¬ 
cluded plantings made as late as 1920, 
was as follows: 

Wine grapes. 26,655 acres 

Table grapes. 50,182 “ 

Raisin grapes. 87,430 “ 

In addition to this there was an 
enormous non-bearing acreage of plant¬ 
ings made in 1921 and 1922 consisting 
of 

Wine grapes. 121,218 acres 

Table grapes. 83,418 “ 

Raisin grapes. 244,195 “ 

Total bearing and non-bear¬ 
ing. 613,098 acres 

The head of the Viticulture Service 
of the California State Department of 
Agriculture estimated (June 20, 1923) 
that on the basis of a normal yield the 
present California grape crop would 
aggregate 1,897,685 tons, consisting of 
wine grapes, 399,760 tons; table grapes, 
353,390 tons; raisin grapes, 1,144,535 
tons. This does not include any grapes 
from the new plantings of 1921 and 
1922. 

A large amount of new acreage was 
also planted in 1922 in Arizona, Col¬ 
orado and Texas, and other sections of 
the irrigated country. In the Ozark 
section of Missouri 5,000 acres of grapes 
are now planted, and it is believed that 
this acreage will be doubled in the next 
two years. In 1922 over 1,000 acres of 
grapes were planted in Florida, and the 
President of the Florida Grape Growers’ 
Association says that some very large 









140 


The Annals op the American Academy 


plantings are “in progress or con¬ 
templated.” Small vineyards are 
springing up by the thousand in all the 
eastern states, and, in fact, in every 
part of the country where grapes can be 
grown. When all of these new plant¬ 
ings come into bearing the production 
will be simply enormous. 

And Still It Continues! 

Nor is this the whole story. In 
1920 this country imported 23,020 
tons of raisins, which is ten times more 
than the total importations of the four 
previous years. We also imported 
27,916 tons of currants, which is more 
than the total imports of the four 
previous years. Our imports of grapes 
from Argentina and Chile were only 
about 18,000 pounds during the whole 
calendar year 1921. In the first four 
months of 1922 the importations from 
these two countries jumped to 494,000 
pounds. 

The raisin growers of California 
complain bitterly of unfair com¬ 
petition by smugglers of whisky. 
In 1922 the California Raisin Grow¬ 
ers’ Association handled 180,000 tons 
of raisins, and expects to handle 
240,000 tons in 1923. It is estimated 
however that, when the new plantings 
come into full bearing, the production 
of raisins will be over 400,000 tons per 
year. The Association has gone into a 
national advertising campaign which 
was apparently planned for the purpose 
of getting the people to use raisins in 
their bread, and on the breakfast table, 
but there are indications that they 
counted heavily upon the home bever¬ 
age trade. The New York papers on 
April 10, 1923, carried the following 
item: “Whisky runners, by heavy 
importations of foreign liquors, are 
breaking the domestic raisin market, 
and California growers face a loss of a 
large part of the market built up since 
prohibition.” According to Aron 


Sapiro, organizer of the Pacific Coast 
Fruit Growers: “The great rush to 
buy raisins and ‘make your own’ now 
has changed to as great a rush to buy 
smuggled goods.” The Raisin Grow¬ 
ers’ Association has recently been re¬ 
organized in order to cope more effect¬ 
ually with the increasing volume of 
production, and after heroic efforts a 
preferred stock issue of two and one- 
half million dollars has finally been 
“put over.” 

According to the Statistical Abstract, 
the consumption of commercial wines 
in the United States in 1914, including 
imports, was 52,418,430 gallons. I 
have estimated that the carload ship¬ 
ments of grapes from California, New 
York, Michigan and Pennsylvania in 
1922 would make a total of 126,808,050 
gallons. If to this is added the wine 
made from California raisins and from 
the grapes grown in all the other states, 
plus the wine made by hundreds of 
thousands of families from dandelions, 
elderberries, currants and rhubarb, it 
is safe to estimate that the people of the 
United States are making for their own 
consumption at least three times the 
amount of wine which was formerly 
made in the great wineries of this coun¬ 
try, plus the imports of wine from 
other countries. 

Question of Enforcement 

There are thousands of dealers in 
materials and apparatus for home 
beverage making. There are over 
200 retailers of “accessories” for home 
beverage making in New York City 
alone. They maintain an organiza¬ 
tion for trade protection and support 
a trade paper which is issued monthly 
and carries 25 pages of advertise¬ 
ments—malt syrups—bottle cappers— 
hops—extracts for cordials—syphon 
tubes—malt extracts—filters—“ rye 
syrup ”—coloring extracts—fermenting 
bungs—barrels, kegs, jugs and glass 




Consumption of Alcoholic Beverages 


141 


jars—flavoring extracts—“caps” and 
corks—bottle stoppers—special sugar 
—“deodorers” and “maturers.” 

One can only conjecture as to the 
reasons which influenced the prohibi¬ 
tion authorities in making such careful 
provision for home wine making. 
Undoubtedly they had no idea of the 
enormous volume of production which 
would be thus developed, nor the argu¬ 
ment which they themselves are fur¬ 
nishing in support of light wines and 
beer. The tenement-house dweller has 
no place to store and mature such 
products, but thousands of them are 
actually making wine and beer and 
drinking it in a raw, crude condition, 
much to the disgust of the owners of 
such places, who are constantly having 
to employ plumbers to remove the 
accumulation of debris in the pipes. 
In all fairness, however, it is probable 
that this act of mercy on the part of 
the prohibition authorities is due only 
in part to tenderness for the farmer or 
consideration for the political im¬ 
portance of the householder, and that 
the main reason which determined 
this policy was the difficulty of carry¬ 
ing prohibition enforcement to the 
point of invading private homes. 
This brings us to the whole question of 
the enforcement of prohibition as a 
police problem. 

The chief trouble today in this 
whole matter is the very general dif¬ 
ference of opinion even among law- 
abiding citizens as to what are exactly 
their rights and privileges under the 
present laws. Is, or is not, the making 
of alcoholic beverages for home con¬ 
sumption a violation of the Eighteenth 
Amendment and the Volstead Act? 
If it is not a violation, then so-called 
prohibition is obviously a farce. It is 
not and cannot be prohibition at all. 
If it is a violation of existing laws, then 
the question is raised as to how it can 
ever be enforced. 


Whatever may be his motive, Mr. 
Ernest E. Cherrington, editor of the 
Anti-Saloon League’s publications, has 
put the matter in a way which appeals 
to the imagination. He shows that 
we have a national borderline extend¬ 
ing 17,500 miles, and that 32 of our 
48 states are on international fron¬ 
tiers. He points out that there are 
10,500,000 automobiles in use today in 
the United States, and that airplanes 
are becoming quite common. 

Smuggling by automobile and airplane 
is so easy, and has become so frequent as a 
result of America’s effort to enforce pro¬ 
hibition, that a radical readjustment of 
international relations in the next few years 
is inevitable. 

Perhaps one should qualify Mr. 
Cherrington’s statement by the ad¬ 
mission that he is speaking on be¬ 
half of the World’s League Against 
Alcoholism, which is the Anti-Saloon 
League’s latest baby. 

The Cost of Enforcement 

President Harding in his speech of 
June 25, 1923, on dry enforcement, 
made a fervid appeal for the coopera¬ 
tion of state authorities in the enforce¬ 
ment of prohibition, but he clearly 
recognized that it is the function of the 
federal Government to deal with smug¬ 
gling. Mr. Wayne B. Wheeler, speak¬ 
ing on behalf of the Anti-Saloon 
League, says that 

the revulsion against prohibition, which has 
been manifested of late in several provinces 
of Canada, has created the need of a block¬ 
ade against rum running along the Cana¬ 
dian border from the Atlantic clear to the 
Pacific, far too extensive for the present 
prohibition agencies to maintain, even 
with the cooperation of the border states. 

The Anti-Saloon League’s Com¬ 
mittee on Resolutions, of which Mr. 
Wheeler is chairman, makes a demand 
upon the federal Government for the 


142 


The Annals of the American Academy 


use of naval forces to check liquor 
running by sea, and many of the pro¬ 
hibitionists are clamoring for the use 
of the Army to enforce prohibition on 
land. No doubt the economy of such 
an operation appeals to them. The 
regular army consists of 125,000 en¬ 
listed men who receive a minimum of 
$30 a month pay and their keep. The 
budget provides for an appropriation 
of $128,000,000 in 1923 for the main¬ 
tenance of the Army, including, of 
course, its officers. This is about 
$1,000 per man, including pay, board 
and uniforms, and the maintenance of 
army posts. The prohibition enforce¬ 
ment officers receive from $1,500 up, 
and it has been a matter of comment 
that their pay is too small to make 
them proof against temptation. The 
Secretary of War, John W. Weeks, 
says: 

I am opposed to the use of the Army for 
enforcement of civil laws unless all civil 
police power shall have been exhausted, 
and there results that state of insurrection 
and rebellion which federal law provides 
shall alone justify the use of troops in 
affording the protection guaranteed to state 
governments by the Constitution. 

It is, however, wrnll for us to face 
the facts. A prohibitory law which 
changes the habits of the nation must 
have the sanction and support of the 
people if it is to be enforced by peace¬ 
ful means. Any law may be enforced at 
the point of the bayonet under military 
rule, at least for a time, but in the 
ordinary process of popular govern¬ 
ment, the people must cooperate in 
the observance of a law, or the ma¬ 
chinery of enforcing it is bound to 
break down. President Harding rec¬ 
ognized quite clearly that there is little 
likelihood of Congress appropriating 
enough money to enable the prohibi¬ 
tion enforcement unit of the Govern¬ 
ment to make an effective showing. 
The patrolling of our 17,500 miles of 


coast and frontiers will of itself require 
a very large force of men, at a cost 
many times greater than the nine mil¬ 
lion dollars which Congress has appro¬ 
priated for the enforcement of pro¬ 
hibition. 

This, however, is only a small part 
of the story. As President Harding 
said: 

The federal Government is not equipped 
with the instrumentalities to make enforce¬ 
ment locally effective. ... If the bur¬ 
den of enforcement shall continue to be 
increasingly thrust upon the federal Govern¬ 
ment, it will be necessary, at large expense, 
to create a federal police authority, which in 
time will inevitably come to be regarded as 
an intrusion upon and interference with the 
right of local authority to manage local 
concerns. 

He spoke >of this as one of the 
“menaces” in this situation. Whether 
it was intended as a threat of the use 
of federal force to crush the people into 
submission, one can only conjecture. 

Existing Conditions 

To me it seems more likely that the 
President had to recognize the im¬ 
possibility of financing the enforce¬ 
ment of prohibition through federal 
agencies, and proposed to unload the 
major part of the responsibility upon 
the states and their municipalities. 
He called attention to the number of 
states which have passed enforcement 
law's of their own, but failed to point 
out that Wisconsin is the only state 
which has made an appropriation for 
the carrying out of its owm enforcement 
laws. A number of state legislatures, 
controlled by rural representatives 
who are responsive to the direction of 
the Anti-Saloon League, have enacted 
such laws as a political gesture, but 
they in turn have “passed the buck” 
to the municipal police and village 
constables. 

Pennsylvania illustrates the point. 


Consumption of Alcoholic Beverages 


143 


Governor Pinchot succeeded in getting 
a most drastic enforcement law passed 
at the last session of the Legislature, 
and then utterly failed to secure an 
appropriation to carry it into effect. 
We now have the curious spectacle of 
the governor of Pennsylvania appeal¬ 
ing to the Women's Christian Temper¬ 
ance Union and other private bodies 
to raise an enforcement fund by sub¬ 
scription, which is to be turned over to 
him for the employment, apparently, 
of private detectives and strong arm 
men under his personal direction as a 
sort of super-policeman. 

Is There a Remedy? 

It is, of course, futile to discuss the 
possibility of repealing the Eighteenth 
Amendment. It is embedded in the 
Constitution and cannot be set aside 
until the time comes when the peo¬ 
ple have a referendum on constitu¬ 
tional questions. What, then, is the 
remedy? 

First of all, let it be noted that the 
meaning and intent of the Eighteenth 
Amendment was limited to the pro¬ 
hibition of intoxicating liquors, which 
to the lay mind, given to a common- 
sense construction of plain words, 
means liquors that are actually in¬ 
toxicating. The Volstead Act has, 
however, enlarged this meaning by 
construing the phrase to include any 
“spirituous, vinous, malt or fermented 
liquors containing one half of one per 
cent of alcohol by volume.” 

In the test case which was carried 
up to the Supreme Court of the 
United States by the Brewing In¬ 
dustry, abundant testimony was 
offered, to the apparent satisfaction of 
the Court, and without contradiction 
by the Government’s attorneys, that 
the so-called war beer containing 
2.75 per cent of alcohol by weight, or 
approximately 3.43 per cent by vol¬ 
ume, is not in fact intoxicating. The 


Supreme Court in its wisdom decided, 
however, that this was beside the 
point, and that for the purpose of 
regulation, Congress could establish 
the arbitrary standard of one half of 
one per cent. The social consequence 
of this was not foreseen. The wage¬ 
earning class, which was thus de¬ 
prived of its cheap and popular bever¬ 
age, has noted the ease with which 
well-to-do people were able to stock 
their cellars, either in anticipation of 
the prohibition act, or through the 
subsequent purchase of smuggled 
goods, regardless of their cost. To 
the workingman the act in its opera¬ 
tion spells class legislation, of which he 
is deeply and naturally resentful. 

The remedy proposed by President 
Harding and the Anti-Saloon League is 
“adequate enforcement,” and still 
more drastic provisions in the law. 
The President stated the problem 
in general terms, but, apparently, he 
had not asked himself how large a 
force would be needed to carry out the 
law, and how much money would be 
required for it. As a police problem it 
is so difficult, so costly, and in all the 
large centers of population, so unpop¬ 
ular, that it seems utterly impractical 
without popular support. 

The Remedy 

If the present Volstead Act in all its 
rigors cannot be enforced, it must be 
modified or it will gradually become a 
dead letter. The people are tired of 
prohibition agitation, and it will not be 
an easy task to win even their acqui¬ 
escence in prohibition, much less their 
affection for it. If, however, the 
Volstead Act is modified to correspond 
to the real language and intent of the 
Eighteenth Amendment, which limits 
prohibition to beverages which are in 
fact intoxicating, what will be the 
result? 


144 


The Annals of the American Academy 


First of all, the wage earner will get 
his beer back, and will have once more 
a cheap, palatable and harmless bever¬ 
age which has certain food value. 
Native wines unfortified with spirits are 
no more intoxicating w r hen they are 
made commercially than when they 
are made in the homes of the people, 
and, of course, commercial wanes are 
far more wholesome than the crude 
home product. By tolerance it is 
probable that in the principal popula¬ 
tion centers such wanes w r ould be read¬ 
ily obtainable. 

The claim of the professional pro¬ 
hibitionist that this would bring back 
the saloon is easily disposed of. The 
sale of beer (and wine if it is permitted) 
could be restricted to bona-fide res¬ 
taurants, hotels and clubs. The fam¬ 
ily trade would be supplied by the 
bottling houses and the grocers. All 
of these agencies should pay a tax to the 
federal Government, and be licensed by 
the municipalities, and such licenses 
should be conditioned upon absolute 
compliance with the other provisions of 
the prohibition law. This would pro¬ 
vide cheap and effective competition 
with the bootlegging saloon, and would 
naturally enlist the powerful hotel, 
restaurant, club and grocery interests 
in support of the law. Undoubtedly, 
the bootlegger w T ould persist, but the 
pressure of competition wrould in a 
short time reduce his activites to the 
minimum. 

There remains the question of medic¬ 
inal liquor. Something must be done 
to enable a sick man to obtain good 
liquor' at^a " moderate price upon the 
prescription of his physician. Event¬ 
ually, the Government will have to 


meet this difficulty by monopolizing 
the business of dispensing such liquor 
through its own agencies. 

I have purposely refrained from 
emphasizing the revenue feature of the 
restoration of beer, but perhaps it is 
worth mentioning that it could be made 
to yield a revenue of between 400 and 
500 million dollars, without taking it 
out of the class of “popular beverages.” 
With such a revenue (wdiich would of 
course be increased very materially for 
local purpose by municipal licenses) 
the burden of prohibition enforcement 
could be met without imposing a direct 
tax upon the people. However, the 
main consideration is whether this 
remedy would be effective in restoring 
the fast-w r aning temperance sentiment 
of the country, and in making the pro¬ 
hibition of intoxicating liquors an 
actuality. 

There is nothing sacro-sanct about 
the Volstead Act, or the complicated 
code of regulations adopted by the 
federal prohibition authorities. These 
measures were drawm wfith the greatest 
care, by men of ability, inspired by the 
Anti-Saloon League’s lawyers; but 
after all, such men are only human, and 
it seems hardly reasonable that at the 
first attempt they should have per¬ 
fected administrative measures for the 
carrying out of a vast social experiment, 
affecting the habits of this great nation 
which comprises members of all the 
races of the w r orld. That the present 
condition of affairs is intolerable is 
apparent to everyone who sees straight 
and thinks clearly. 

National prohibition cannot be 
forced; it must have the cooperation of 
the people! 


Liquor in International Trade 

By Wayne B. Wheeler, LL.D. 

Anti-Saloon League of America 


D isturbing the peace of a 

neighborhood or imperilling the 
comity of nations weigh lightly in the 
scales with the liquor interests when 
their profit is involved. Neither ordi¬ 
nances of a village council nor the 
principles of international law can 
command the respect of this traffic. 
Lawless in its essential being, it has 
violated every law of God and man 
and will continue to do so until it has 
been rooted out of society. 

There is nothing new under the sun 
in liquor’s lawlessness. It is today 
applying to international trade the 
same criminality which marked its 
relation to domestic trade. It has 
only one program: to sell what, where 
and to whom it will, regardless of any 
restraining power. While it retains a 
single base of operation in the world, it 
will wage its piratical war upon civi¬ 
lization. Its sole motive is a selfish 
determination to reap profits regard¬ 
less of the rights of others—legally if 
it may—illegally if it must. 

Magnitude of Trade 

The magnitude of the trade in the 
other nations of the world makes it a 
menacing factor in the enforcement of 
prohibition in the United States and 
other dry countries. Not the con¬ 
sumer but the dealer in intoxicants is 
the real center of the opposition to the 
enforcement of prohibition. Doing a 
business aggregating many billions of 
dollars annually, the men who make 
a wholesale profit from the retail vices 
of men are bitterly contesting every 
effort to make the world decent and 
sober. No other single factor in in¬ 
ternational trade can command the 

11 


organized support of politicians and 
financiers that is given the beverage 
liquor traffic. It honeycombs the 
public life of all Europe. Small 
wonder, then, that all the nations in 
Europe except two are fighting to 
regulate, restrain or to exterminate 
this evil. 

In Great Britain, the annual drink 
bill in 1921 was 403,000,000 pounds 
sterling, according to George B. Wil¬ 
son, of the United Kingdom Alliance. 
The revenue of the Government from 
the customs, excise and licenses was 
201,266,543 pounds sterling in that 
year. In France, one person in every 
eight is engaged in the liquor business, 
in some way, according to Pastor 
Georges Gallienne of the Blue Cross 
Society, w r hile the nation expended in 
1921 over thirty billion francs for 
drink. Impoverished Germany spent 
twenty billion marks for spirits in 
1921. 

In Great Britain, some members of 
the House of Lords and of the Com¬ 
mons are leaders in the brewery or 
distilling business. The church it¬ 
self is honeycombed by these men who 
profit by the ruin of their fellows. The 
bitter opposition to Lady Astor’s 
measure, forbidding the sale of drink 
to minors under 18, came from those 
who would profit by the drunkenness 
of youth and not from youth desiring 
the exhilaration of an occasional glass. 
With their immense profits, their 
social prestige and their political power 
at stake, the liquor barons of Europe do 
not hesitate to invade the sovereignty 
of other nations when these attempt 
to restrain the traffic or to limit their 
importations. 


146 


The Annals of the American Academy 


European Restrictive Measures 

Iceland was compelled to suspend 
the operation of her prohibition at the 
command of Spain, who refused to 
admit Iceland’s ships if Spanish wines 
were denied entry to Iceland. Fin¬ 
land faced like threats through the 
trade treaties of France and Spain, but 
the new republic has maintained its 
law in spite of the boycott of the “ wet” 
nations. Norway voted permanent 
prohibition in 1921 by a large majority, 
but France, under a trade treaty, 
forced the government of Norway 
to purchase 500,000 litres of spirits 
and wines. Spain has made a like 
demand upon Norway. Norway’s 
earlier temperance legislation, aimed 
at the reduction of the importation of 
wines, was repealed by the Norwegian 
Parliament when the French Bourse 
threatened to boycott the loans needed 
by Norway for new railroad lines. 

Relations between Hungary and her 
neighbors, Austria, Czechoslovakia 
and Serbia are affected by the fact 
that Hungary has a bumper wine crop 
to add to the crops of the last four 
years, which crowd her cellars today 
for want of customers. Austria, for¬ 
merly Hungary's best customer, is too 
poor to buy. Czechoslovakia and 
Serbia are both wine-producing coun¬ 
tries and the rivalry between them 
and Hungary complicates the European 
political problem. In almost all of 
the countries during the war, restric¬ 
tions in some form were placed upon 
the sale of alcoholic liquors. In Scot¬ 
land under the first vote taken under 
the veto law, or local option law, forty 
towns voted no license, while in forty- 
six towns the vote was in favor of a 
25 per cent reduction in the number of 
licenses. Prohibition obtains in prac¬ 
tically all of the provinces in Canada. 
In New Zealand the people have taken 
a vote upon the prohibition question 


and a majority of 55,000 was recorded 
in its favor, but, since the law requires a 
three-fifths vote, the measure was de¬ 
feated. Other elections are to be held 
and it is predicted by those conver¬ 
sant with conditions that prohibition 
will win. Elections are also to be held 
in Tasmania. There is an aggressive 
temperance movement on foot in 
Australia and it is asserted by some 
that it will become the first continent 
to adopt prohibition. 

These are a few illustrations of the 
tendency towards restrictive measures 
upon the liquor business which have 
caused the liquor interests, in the 
countries where they have the strong¬ 
est political hold, to unite in a concerted 
action to defeat the will of the people 
expressed in such legislation. On the 
other hand, when the tremendous 
amount of capital invested in the liq¬ 
uor business in a few of the countries 
of Europe is considered, the strong 
motive for an aggressive campaign to 
attempt to influence the political 
policies of other nations becomes 
apparent. 

The interference of the liquor traf¬ 
fic with both international and domes¬ 
tic policies has aligned with the pro¬ 
hibition forces in Europe those who 
are fighting for the new democracy. 
In Germany a plebiscite taken at 
Bielefeld gave 12,626 votes for pro¬ 
hibition and only 416 against. A local 
option law, making a vote on prohibi¬ 
tion obligatory in any community if 
requested by one fifth of the qualified 
electors, has passed the Reichsrat and 
the Economic Parliament and was 
presented to the Reichstag in June. 
Eleven hundred prohibition hotels and 
inns have been opened in that country, 
caring for 200,000 persons in 1921. 

Austria has prohibited the sale of 
liquor to minors { under 18, and the 
Government plans to spend fifty mil¬ 
lion jkronen on a campaign for a “dry” 


Liquor in International Trade 


Austria."^ Denmark is close to prohibi¬ 
tion, Copenhagen today blocking the 
way. Belgium found her national 
prosperity aided by prohibition of the 
sale of spirits. Holland expects to 
adopt a local veto bill in a short time. 
Italy is closing thousands of saloons. 
The manufacture of non-alcoholic 
grape drinks is replacing wine drinking. 
Switzerland is planning local option 
laws for the various cantons. The 
excesses of the liquor interests in 
Europe—as was true in America—has 
caused the reaction which expresses it¬ 
self today in increasingly stringent 
prohibition legislation. 

Disregard of International 
Friendship 

America’s enormous contribution, 
by loans or by gift, to the relief of war- 
stricken Europe was ignored by the 
liquor interests in those same nations 
who, through their press, advocated 
retaliation if we closed our gates to 
their wines and liquors. The growing 
sense of solidity with Europe, making 
slow headway against our traditional 
policy of isolation, received a rude 
check as our people read with amaze¬ 
ment the fulminations of European 
wine growers. That these did not 
actually represent either their govern¬ 
ments or their own nations was not 
always clearly understood. What was 
understood, however, was this: That 
liquor interests, whether at home or 
abroad, did not consider international 
friendships of sufficient moment to out¬ 
weigh a possible loss of export trade in 
wine. The fact that the people of the 
United States have put more than 
seventeen billions of dollars into 
Europe since the war started, counts 
for little with the selfish liquor trade. 
Throughout the world, therefore, the 
warfare is being waged by those who 
place human welfare above financial 
gain against those who seek to pre¬ 


147 

serve a business which has but one 
argument for its existence—that of 
profits. Whenever a contest of world¬ 
wide nature is begun, for the control of 
an evil which has the backing of power¬ 
ful financial interests, a stubborn war¬ 
fare may be expected. Only recently 
have we seen an illustration of this in 
connection with the campaign which is 
being waged throughout the civilized 
world to stamp out the narcotic 
evil. 

Delegates representing the United 
States recently submitted proposals 
before the Opium Committee of the 
League of Nations at Geneva. These 
proposals sought to effectuate the pur¬ 
pose of the Hague Opium Convention 
entered into by a large number of the 
leading world powers. The proposals 
presented by the American delegates 
were very simple. They merely con¬ 
templated that the various nations 
exercise a control over the production 
of raw opium in such a manner that 
there should be no opium produced 
over and above the requirements of 
legitimate medicinal needs, and all 
nations were urged to prohibit exporta¬ 
tion of opium in any form to countries 
which were not parties to the Hague 
Opium Convention and which did not 
have domestic systems of control. In 
British India the cultivation of the 
poppy from which opium is made is an 
extensive industry, and the Govern¬ 
ment advances money without interest 
to the poor farmers to encourage its 
cultivation. While Great Britain is a 
signatory to the Hague Convention on 
Opium, it was largely through British 
influence that certain amendments to 
the American proposals were adopted 
which tend to defeat their purpose. 

Effort to Combat Prohibition in 
United States 

At a conference of representatives of 
the wine and liquor interests of Europe 



148 


The Annals of the American Academy 


last year, plans were formulated to com¬ 
bat the growth of prohibition senti¬ 
ment. There have been considerable 
evidences in the United States of the 
attempts by the French wine interests 
to support the movement for so-called 
light wines and beer in the United 
States and it is currently reported that 
they will attempt to influence the at¬ 
titude of the political parties in the 
coming presidential election. 

When any financial interests seeks to 
do more than to promote its business by 
legitimate means and undertakes by 
clandestine methods to defeat or thwart 
the will of the people of any country 
expressed in law, it forfeits all claim to 
respectability and becomes in fact an 
international outlaw. 

International Questions 

The first question of international 
importance which arose in the United 
States, as a result of the adoption of the 
Eighteenth Amendment, was its effect 
upon the rights guaranteed to Great 
Britain under a treaty concluded in 
1871, which gave to the citizens of 
Great Britain the right to trans-ship 
merchandise through the United States 
in customs bond. It was insisted by 
certain British shipping interests that 
under this treaty they were entitled 
to ship liquors through the United 
States notwithstanding the Eighteenth 
Amendment. This contention was 
denied by the government of the 
United States. The question was 
finally brought before the Supreme 
Court of the United States for a deci¬ 
sion. This Court said: 

The Eighteenth Amendment meant a 
great revolution in the policy of this coun¬ 
try and presumably and obviously meant 
to upset a good many things off as well as 
on the statute books. 

The effect of this decision was to 
deny the right of British citizens to ship 


liquors through the United States 
although destined for a point without 
the United States. This decision vio¬ 
lated no principle of international law, 
as it has been repeatedly held that 
a treaty may be abrogated by legisla¬ 
tion, particularly where the legislation 
is of the dignity of an amendment to the 
Constitution. As a practical matter 
this decision was of incalculable benefit 
in the enforcement of the prohibi¬ 
tion statutes. Before the matter was 
finally settled by the ruling of the 
Supreme Court, liquors were frequently 
being consigned from Canada or Mex¬ 
ico through the United States to 
fictitious consignees in other countries. 
When such shipments arrived within 
the United States, by prearrangement 
they were robbed, the liquor was di¬ 
verted to beverage use and their being 
no real consignee, of course, no com¬ 
plaint was filed and the transaction 
was unknown to this Government, un¬ 
less by chance a portion of the liquor 
was seized by federal agents after it had 
been diverted in transit. 

Liquor on Foreign Vessels Within 

the Territorial Waters of the 
United States 

The next question to engage inter¬ 
national attention, as a result of en¬ 
forcement of prohibition in the United 
States, grew out of the decision of the 
United States Supreme Court that 
the Eighteenth Amendment applied 
equally to vessels of the United States 
and foreign vessels when within the 
territorial waters of the United States, 
but that it had no application beyond 
the three-mile limit. This decision 
has met with considerable protest 
from several of the foreign nations. 
In some countries, notably in France 
and Italy, the statutes of those coun¬ 
tries require that the crews and pas¬ 
sengers of the vessels carrying their 
flag shall be supplied with a certain 


Liquor in International Trade 


149 


wine ration. It is insisted by the 
representatives of these governments 
that to prohibit their vessels from 
entering the ports of the United 
States with the wine ration required 
by their laws does violence to the 
comity of nations, and attempts have 
been made to secure, through adminis¬ 
trative rulings, a modification of the 
interpretation of the law as defined by 
the Supreme Court. 

As a matter of fact there is no ques¬ 
tion of international law involved. 
Every sovereign nation has the right 
to fix the terms upon which the vessels 
of another nation may enter its ports 
seeking its trade. This principle was 
enunciated by Chief Justice Marshall 
in the early history of this country and 
has become a well-established prin¬ 
ciple of our jurisprudence. Not only 
may we fix the conditions upon which 
such vessels may enter but, as a sov¬ 
ereign nation, we are possessed of the 
power and the right, under interna¬ 
tional law, to prohibit their entrance 
altogether. The suggestion that for¬ 
eign nations have the right to legislate 
with reference to our territorial waters 
finds no support in any principle of 
law, either municipal or international. 
If a foreign nation may be permitted to 
legislate with reference to one subject, 
they may legislate with reference to 
others. No sovereign nation could 
ever acknowledge the existence of such 
a right as a matter of law. It may see 
fit to waive the exercise of its rights if 
in its legislative wisdom it deems best. 
The question, therefore, as to whether 
this privilege should be accorded to 
foreign vessels under the Eighteenth 
Amendment resolves itself into one of 
policy and not of law. 

The Smuggling Problem 

With the withdrawals of liquor from 
bonded warehouses reduced to a mini¬ 
mum, the development of liquor smug¬ 


gling increased. Both passenger au¬ 
tomobiles and trucks brought sup¬ 
plies from Canada. The motor-boat 
traffic on the Great Lakes carried in¬ 
toxicants to the larger cities, notably 
Detroit. The border between Wash¬ 
ington, Idaho and Montana and Can¬ 
ada was the scene of much smuggling 
since in the province of British Co¬ 
lumbia a number of export houses were 
authorized to import liquor into the 
province and export it under Canadian 
law. Hundreds of boats clearing from 
Vancouver and Victoria carried their 
“ wet ” goods to points on the American 
coast. The larger quantity, however, 
was shipped direct to Ensenada, Mex¬ 
ico, where after a brief period of 
storage it was smuggled into the 
southern part of California. The 
4,000 miles of coastline on Puget 
Sound offered opportunity for hundreds 
of boats to bring in liquor obtained 
from the British Columbia export 
houses. 

The Atlantic coast line from Florida 
to North Carolina has been the scene 
of more liquor smuggling than any 
other portion of our territory. The 
Bahamas have been the source of sup¬ 
ply for vessels which would trans-ship 
their cargoes to other, smaller vessels 
some 20 miles from the American 
coast. 

Two sets of clearance papers have 
usually been carried by these vessels. 
The port named in the regular papers 
was rarely visited. Other ports, 
where a ready market for their liquors 
was certain, were named in false 
clearance papers. Vessels which were 
exclusively devoted to rum running, 
and other vessels in legitimate trade 
have taken aboard large quantities of 
liquor hidden under coal bunkers, in 
oil tanks or in some other of the in¬ 
numerable hiding places where con¬ 
siderable quantities of bottled goods 
can be concealed. Leakage from ships 


150 


The Annals of the American Academy 


carrying beverage alcohol for use of 
passengers or crew was notorious, until 
the decision or the Supreme Court 
interpreted the law as forbidding the 
transportation of beverage intoxicants 
into our ports on any vessels. 

Consignment from Canadian prov¬ 
inces to non-permit holders in this 
country brought in large quantities 
of distilled spirits, until this phase 
of the traffic was largely eliminated 
by activity of the enforcement offi¬ 
cials. 

The use of passenger automobiles, 
with cases packed behind the seats, 
smuggling in coffins, hearses or in the 
automobile cortege of real or pre¬ 
tended funerals crossing the Canadian 
line, or the use of trunks or bales and 
boxes with false bottoms or sides, were 
devices resorted to by the smaller fry 
among the rum runners. The aero¬ 
plane, while featuring sensationally in 
occasional news-stories of liquor smug¬ 
gling, has not become a factor in the 
illicit traffic. 

The actual quantity thus reaching 
the American public has been only a 
fraction, however, of the amount re¬ 
ported by popular rumor. The total 
amount of smuggled goods reaching 
America in any year is only a decimal 
fraction of one per cent of the amount 
of distilled spirits consumed here be¬ 
fore prohibition. The total exports of 
distilled spirits from the British Isles 
to the American continent, the Ber¬ 
mudas, Bahamas and British West 
Indies, was 1,438,989 proof gallons in 
1922. The consumption of distilled 
spirits in America in 1917, the last 
year unrestricted by anti-liquor regu¬ 
lations, was 167,740,325 proof gallons. 
If every drop of the British exports 
mentioned was smuggled into Amer¬ 
ica—an absurdity on its very face—the 
total would be only 85 ten-thousandths 
part of our ordinary pre-prohibition 
consumption. 


Possible Defenses to Cope with 
Outlawry 

Against these violations of our laws, 
we have a number of possible defenses. 
First, naturally, is the enforcing of the 
law both on American and foreign 
ships within our three-mile limit. If 
this is done, all liquor found within our 
territorial waters is contraband and 
may be seized unless actually medic¬ 
inal stores. 

Agencies of the Government hither¬ 
to either unused or used only in a 
small degree, may be employed more 
fully than hitherto. The coast guard, 
the customs officials, and immigration 
officers not only have access at times to 
valuable information affecting smug¬ 
gling of liquors, but are frequently in 
strategic position to aid in enforcement 
of the law. 

The use of ships of the Navy and 
men of the Navy to assist the coast 
guard in the discharge of their duties 
has been advocated. Many of the 
smuggling problems, involving illegal 
entry of immigrants, importation of 
narcotics or other articles without 
payment of duty, as well as enforce¬ 
ment of the prohibition laws, might be 
made simpler if there was coordinated 
effort of various branches of the Gov¬ 
ernment. The Navy Department is in 
a unique position as possible aid in the 
enforcement of the Constitution against 
smugglers. This would not mean the 
employment of the Navy as such, but 
merely the use of certain vessels to 
cope with emergencies which frequently 
arise. The alternative to this would 
be the equipping of the customs service 
or the prohibition enforcement offi¬ 
cials with fast vessels, arms and men at 
costly expense, to do comparatively 
rare bits of service, which could be 
more readily and successfully per¬ 
formed by some of the smaller vessels 
under the control of the Navy. 



Liquor in International Trade 


151 


The Edmonds Bill, backed by 
certain shipping interests, providing 
that no merchant vessel shall enter the 
territorial waters of the United States 
if the person in charge thereof has sold 
or permitted to be sold thereon intoxi¬ 
cating liquor for beverage purposes 
during the voyage, may be again urged 
in the next Congress to protect Ameri¬ 
can ships from discrimination. 

Clearance papers should also be 
refused to any ship within our harbors 
carrying contraband liquor or which 
has violated the laws of this country. 
Furthermore, where ships carrying 
liquor come within our three-mile zone 
on the plea of stress of weather, such 
vessels should not be allowed to leave 
our jurisdiction except under bond for 
the delivery of their cargo at the port 
of destination, the bond to be twice the 
value of the liquor and cargo. 

Extend Three-Mile Limit 

The so-called three-mile limit should 
be extended to meet modern condi¬ 
tions, either by international agree¬ 
ment or act of Congress. The prin¬ 
ciple upon which this limit was origi¬ 
nally established was the distance which 
a nation could defend by its shore 
batteries. It was based upon the 
protective theory. When the rule was 
stated, three miles was approximately 
the distance of cannon shot, hence the 
limit came to be stated as three miles. 
This is not a fixed boundary, but merely 
a convenient minimum limit adopted 
by the administrative branch of the 
Government in the absence of a legis¬ 
lative definition in our early history. 
Congress may alter this limit in con¬ 
formity with the reasons underlying 
the rule of international law whenever 
it desires. A measure authorizing 
prohibition officers to board ships six 
leagues or eighteen miles from the 
coast was proposed by Senator Sterling 
last year. It was withheld pending 


some diplomatic conversations with 
Great Britain on this subject. Diplo¬ 
matic exchanges on this point have 
been renewed—more or less officially— 
in the discussion of the enforcement of 
the law against liquor on ships enter¬ 
ing American ports. 

The existence of a rum fleet, lying 
just outside the three-mile limit, dis¬ 
charging liquor into small boats for 
smuggling into our territory, is a 
practical attack upon our sovereignty. 
Such a fleet is shooting actual holes in 
our Constitution. No cloak of inter¬ 
national courtesy or custom should 
shield these violators of our laws. The 
extension of our jurisdiction over our 
coast waters will reduce considerably 
the amount of successful liquor smug¬ 
gling. 

Proposed Reciprocal Treaty 

The proposal of the State Depart¬ 
ment to seek a reciprocal treaty with 
certain foreign nations, giving them 
the right to bring beverage liquor into 
our territorial waters under seal, and 
allowing the trans-shipment of such 
liquors through the United States in 
exchange for the privilege of search of 
vessels suspected of carrying contra¬ 
band liquors within twelve miles of our 
coasts would probably be legal, but it 
meets strong objections both in the 
United States and abroad. 

In this country it is pointed out that 
the United States already has the 
right of search and visitation within 
the twelve-mile limit established in 
law for more than one hundred years. 
The last tariff bill recognized it in 
authorizing search within this limit to 
prevent smuggling. Customs col¬ 
lectors, naval officers, inspectors and 
officers of revenue cutters have the 
right to board, examine and search 
vessels bound for the United States 
within twelve miles of the coast. The 
proposed treaty would give no new 


152 


The Annals of the American Academy 


authority to this country, but might 
complicate the enforcement of our law, 
through the surrender of our rights by 
granting permission to bring in intoxi¬ 
cating liquors under bonds. The 
difficulty of securing proof that vessels 
found within the twelve-mile limit 
were planning to smuggle liquor into 
the country would still exist. 

Some American shipping interests 
object to the proposed treaty as an 
unjust discrimination in favor of 
foreign vessels, made at the time when 
we are striving to maintain an efficient 
merchant marine. The difficulties ex¬ 
perienced by our ships in competing 
with foreign shipping on account of the 
lower wages and lower standards of 
other shipowners would be increased 
by this concession. 

Wilful Violation of Law Must 
Stop 

The numerous wilful violations of 
our law by foreign ships who have 
abused our hospitality does not en¬ 
title them to any unusual considera¬ 
tion. From stores of liquor apparently 
sealed much liquor has leaked into the 
country in the past. Intoxicants have 
been found in almost every part of 
vessels arriving from foreign ports, 
often brought here without the knowl¬ 
edge of the master. 

The trans-shipment of liquor through 
the United States under bond, before 
the decision of the Supreme Court 
forbade this, furnished an opportunity 
for a large quantity of liquor to find its 


way into this country. In its decision 
in the case of Grogan v. Walker , the 
Supreme Court said: 

It is obvious that those whose wishes 
and opinions were embodied in the 
Amendment meant to stop the whole busi¬ 
ness. They did not want intoxicating 
liquor in the United States and reasonably 
may have thought that if they let it in, 
some of it was likely to stay. 

The United States has no inclination 
to interfere with the internal affairs of 
other nations. It is simply a question 
of enforcing the laws of our own coun¬ 
try within our jurisdiction. Experi¬ 
ence proves that, if beverage liquors 
are permitted to be imported within 
the three-mile limit, much of it will 
remain here. The Solicitor General of 
the United States, Mr. Beck, who is 
not an advocate of prohibition, ex¬ 
pressed it this way in London on July 
4, 1923. He is reported by the As¬ 
sociated Press as follows: 

. . . He asserted that the liquor 

embargo would not have been imposed on 
foreign ships if it had not been for deliber¬ 
ate and consistent violation of the Amer¬ 
ican laws and abuse of American hospital¬ 
ity within the harbors of the United States. 

“Americans are very jealous of the maj¬ 
esty of their laws,” he said, “and they re¬ 
sented this invasion of them by foreign 
nations. The American people, in support¬ 
ing prohibition, are making a great ex¬ 
periment and feel that they cannot jeop¬ 
ardize the success of that experiment by 
allowing continued smuggling of liquor by 
European ships.” 


Editor’s Footnote: It is a difficult matter to determine the extent to which 
liquor is smuggled into the United States. The figures on the next two pages, 
however, may shed some light on the question. 


Liquor in International Trade 


153 


STATISTICS 


GIVEN TO THE 


BRITISH PARLIAMENT 


TABLE I— British Exports of Spirits 


Country of Destination 


Proof Gallons 


1918 

1919 

1920 

1921 

1922 

Canada. 

148,988 

527,949 

1,701,734 

1,245,988 

803,105 

China (exclusive of Hong Kong, Macao 
and leased Territories). 

49,835 

44,573 

92,207 

106,249 

91,009 

Japan (including Formosa and Japanese 
leased Territories in China). 

26,376 

26,798 

53,361 

46,516 

61,034 

Mexico. 

2,955 

9,266 

34,436 

43,844 

24,682 

British West India Islands. 

20,654 

28,647 

107,039 

77,430 

91,459 

Cuba. 

3,529 

10,614 

43,709 

28,558 

60,655 

Haiti. 

116 

119 

1,819 

1,808 

5,581 

Bahamas. 

944 

15,133 

118,599 

160,579 

385,999 

Bermudas. 

958 

6,450 

16,018 

22,396 

41,124 


TABLE II— British and Irish Spirits Exports to Mexico and the West Indies 



1918 

1919 

1920 

• 1921 

1922 

Mexico. 

2,955 

9,266 

34,436 

43,844 

24,682 

British West India Islands. . 

20,654 

28,647 

107,039 

77,430 

91,459 

Cuba. 

3,529 

10,614 

43,709 

28,558 

60,655 

Haiti. 

116 

119 

1,819 

1,808 

5,581 

Bahamas. 

944 

15,133 

118,599 

160,579 

385,999 

Bermudas. 

958 

6,450 

16,018 

22,396 

41,124 












































154 


The Annals of the American Academy 


TABLE III—Quantity in Proof Gallons, and Value of Spirits Imported by Countries 
Adjacent to the United States in 1920, 1921, and in Certain Cases for 1922 or 1923 
(from Official Statistics of the Specified Countries) 


Countries of 
Destination 

Proof Gallons 

Value in £ 

1920 

1921 

1922 

1920 

1921 

1922 

Canada. 

Newfoundland. 

British West Indies. 

Bahamas. 

Bermudas. 

Cuba. 

1,741,432 

6,776 

107,116 

118,599 

16,018 

43,709 

7,313 

34,436 

1,267,256 

16,561 

77,532 

201,575 

22,396 

28,558 

5,845 

96,249 

803,105 

2,542,853 

10,083 

154,060 

174,195 

21,446 

56,314 

10,405 

48,821 

1,996,143 

25,408 

114,307 

266,176 

32,386 

41,837 

8,484 

97,143 

1,308,538 

Dominican Republic. 

Mexico. 








Proof Gallons 

Value in £ 

January 

1922 

April 

1923 

January 

1922 

April 

1923 

Canada. 

278,979 

167,686 

219,528 

350,311 

428,031 

234,167 

348,394 

539,338 

British West Indies, Bahamas, Guiana. . . 


One imperial proof gallon = 1.36944 U. S. proof gallons 
Average value of the pound sterling: 

1920: £l =$3.6643 

1921: 3.8491 

1922: 4.4286 

Jan.-Apr., 1923: 4.6741 


Imports of Distilled Spirits for the 11 Months Ending February 



1922 

1923 

1922 

1923 

* 

Gallons 

Gallons 

Dollars 

Dollars 

Canada. 

1,276,560 

1,105,907 

21,703,084 

18,112,464 







































































Politics in the Enforcement of the Liquor Laws 

By Arthur Capper 

Ignited States Senate 


T HE liquor interests have always 
taken to politics like a toper to his 
booze. The extraordinary evils which 
have uniformly attended the liquor 
business under any form of legislation 
have made it the point of constant 
attack by the believers in good govern¬ 
ment. Scarcely a regular session of the 
legislature of any state, or of the Con¬ 
gress of the United States has ever 
been held during the history of this 
country but that there have been 
measures offered or considered, which 
in some way have related to the liquor 
business. Even in our city and town 
councils it has continually been the 
subject of legislation. 

Why the Liquor Question Enters 
Politics 

Because of the tremendous appeal of 
alcoholic stimulants to the weakness of 
human appetite, the liquor business has 
ever held out alluring prospects to those 
who would make large profits with 
slight expenditure of effort. No sales¬ 
men were necessary, attractive adver¬ 
tising was superfluous. Liquor could be 
sold amid the most attractive surround¬ 
ings or in a veritable dive. It was 
simply a matter of choice upon the part 
of the seller as to the class of society 
from which he would secure his patrons. 
In other lines of business it is necessary 
for the merchant to build his business 
upon the merits of his merchandise, the 
personality of the proprietor, the 
method of marketing or upon other 
qualities which will give his commodity 
a popular preference over that of his 
competitor. The facility with which 
liquor could be sold and the unusually 


large return in profit, gave an impelling 
incentive to those engaged in the 
business to fight to maintain their 
existence; while the constant legislative 
attack upon the business, because of 
the evils which flowed from it, caused 
the liquor interests to enter the realm 
of politics early in our national history 
and to continue in politics until the 
present hour, fighting for the preserva¬ 
tion of special privilege. 

Liquor Interests Always a 
Corrupter of Politics 

One of the stock arguments of those 
who oppose the policy of national 
constitutional prohibition is that it 
tends to promote grafting and official 
corruption. They point to instances 
of forgeries of permits and the illicit 
withdrawal of liquors from bonded 
warehouses, with the connivance of 
officers of the law, or to cases in which 
bootleggers or smugglers have evaded 
the laws with the knowledge and pro¬ 
tection of officials whose duty it was to 
prevent it, and seek to create the im¬ 
pression that such practices originated 
with the adoption of the Eighteenth 
Amendment. Such propagandists are 
either wilfully endeavoring to mislead 
the public or are lamentably ignorant 
of our national history. 

In the first place, where such corrup¬ 
tion exists at present, who is responsible 
for it? It is not the law-abiding citi¬ 
zen, but the individual who wishes to 
secure ill-gotten gains by engaging in 
an illicit traffic. It is the liquor inter¬ 
ests who are responsible. To use these 
illegal practices as an argument for the 
restoration of the liquor business to a 


156 


The Annals of the American Academy 


licensed status is the height of incon¬ 
sistency. By the same reasoning we 
should repeal all speed laws because the 
speed maniac disregards them. The 
solution is to be found in enforcing the 
law legally enacted by the required 
constitutional majority—not in sub¬ 
mission to the dictates of an irreconcil¬ 
able minority. But the suggestion 
that official corruption originated or is 
materially increased by national prohi¬ 
bition is utterly false. The history of 
the liquor interests of this country has 
been one of intimidation, opposition to 
majority rule, of determination to 
preserve special privilege at whatever 
cost, wdiether by constitutional or un¬ 
constitutional means, and regardless of 
the sacrifice of official integrity or civic 
righteousness. 

Whisky Insurrection —1794 

The first test which came to the Fed¬ 
eral Union to determine whether this 
was to be an enduring government 
grew out of the opposition of the 
whisky interests to the collection of an 
excise tax of 11 cents per gallon on dis¬ 
tilled spirits, levied under an act of 
Congress passed during the administra¬ 
tion of President Washington. This 
w T as called the Whisky Insurrection of 
1794. So serious w r as the opposition of 
the distillers in certain sections of 
Pennsylvania that the President called 
out the militia of New Jersey, Penn¬ 
sylvania, Maryland and Virginia, 
placed them under command of Gen¬ 
eral Harry Lee, of Virginia, and ordered 
them to the scene of trouble. Presi¬ 
dent Washington joined the forces at 
Bedford, wdiere he established sub¬ 
ordination among the undisciplined 
troops. It w r as only the firm and de¬ 
termined stand taken by President 
Washington which prevented the dis¬ 
ruption of the federal government 
almost at its inception by the liquor 
question. 


Whisky Ring —1874 

In 1874 the official corruption and 
graft which prevailed in the Internal 
Revenue Service became a grave 
national scandal. Benjamin H. Bris¬ 
tow, who was appointed Secretary of 
the Treasury in June of that year, 
found much in his department for an 
efficient administrator to reform. He 
discovered that since 1870 or 1871 
there had existed a whisky ring com¬ 
posed of Internal Revenue officers and 
distillers of St. Louis with official 
accomplices in Washington, among 
whom was divided the money coming 
from the illegal appropriation of the tax 
on a large quantity of distilled spirits. 
The Merchant’s Exchange Statistics 
for 1874 indicated, by the computation 
of the figures showing the quantity of 
whisky shipped and consumed, as 
compared w r ith that on which the 
tax was paid, that the Government 
was being defrauded of revenue of 
$1,200,000. One distiller in 1871 and 
1872 distilled about $1,500,000 worth, 
of which $300,000 was “crooked.” 
This case was typical. 

It was asserted that during the years 
1871, 1872 and 1873, three times as 
much whisky w r as shipped from St. 
Louis as paid a tax. If a distiller w r as 
honest he w r as charged with some 
technical violation of the law, his dis¬ 
tillery w r as seized by the officials and he 
was given the choice of bankruptcy or 
a partnership in their illegal combina¬ 
tion, and generally he succumbed. 
John McDonald, supervisor of Internal 
Revenue in St. Louis, who was later 
convicted of complicity in the frauds, 
estimated that during this period the 
Government was defrauded of revenue 
amounting to $2,786,000. 

The ramifications of this whisky 
ring extended so far as to include men 
of high position in the Treasury De¬ 
partment. General Babcock, private 


Politics in the Enforcement of the Liquor Laws 


157 


secretary to President Grant, was im¬ 
plicated, indicted and tried for al¬ 
leged participation in the combination. 
Though acquitted by the jury, under 
the instructions of the court, of guilt 
of any criminal offense, the evidence 
was sufficient to show grave indiscre¬ 
tions, to say the least. 

Whisky Trust 

The Internal Revenue System, in¬ 
augurated in 1862, largely solidified the 
liquor interests and made possible the 
powerful hold which they subsequently 
obtained in American politics. The 
firm establishment of the business as a 
dependable source of governmental 
revenue gave to it an inestimable ad¬ 
vantage in waging the political fight 
for its existence. The stability thus 
acquired attracted large investments of 
capital and the industry was organized 
with a thoroughness almost unprece¬ 
dented. The trust system, which had 
come to be applied to many forms of 
business, was extended to liquor. 
Agreements as to wages and prices were 
drawn by the concerted action of the 
brewers and distillers. Numerous or¬ 
ganizations of wholesale and retail 
liquor dealers were formed throughout 
the Union. Large trade journals were 
established, publicity bureaus were 
maintained for propaganda purposes, 
and special counsel retained to urge 
state and national legislation in their 
behalf. 

The official proceedings of the an¬ 
nual meetings of the National Retail 
Liquor Dealers’ Association are largely 
filled with reports from the Congres¬ 
sional Committee and other commit¬ 
tees within the organization, reporting 
upon the political activity of their 
agents in seeking to shape the char¬ 
acter of legislation relating to the 
liquor trade. In New York in 1884, 
out of 1,002 primaries and other polit¬ 
ical meetings which preceded the 


November election, there were 719 
held in saloons or next door to them. 
In most of the assembly districts it 
was difficult to find a small hall that 
was not in connection with a saloon, 
for the profits arising from such a 
combination forbade the competition of 
a hall free from saloon control. In 
New York City the saloon vote was 
estimated by conservatives to be one 
seventh of the whole. Mr. Theodore 
Roosevelt, afterwards president of the 
United States, in magazine articles 
called attention to the growing polit¬ 
ical influence of the liquor dealers in 
New York City. 

One of the first prosecutions under 
the Sherman Anti-Trust Act was 
brought against the whisky trust. 
Its control was vested in a board of 
trustees. Five different corporations, 
owned and operated by distillers in 
and about Peoria, Illinois, became its 
first members. By May 10, 1888, it 
had absorbed 81 different distilling 
corporations and five operating dis¬ 
tilleries from Maine to California. 
So far as disclosed, the whisky trust 
was the only combination charged 
with the use of dynamite to bring 
recalcitrants into the fold. Explo¬ 
sions on December 10, 1888, at the 
Shufeldt Distillery, at Chicago, are 
illustrative of the extremes to which 
this combination went in an effort to 
accomplish its purpose. In the trial 
of these cases, it developed that a wit¬ 
ness was offered the sum of $100,000 
to vary his testimony. 

Political Methods of Brewers Re¬ 
vealed by Senate Investigation 

The methods by which the brewers 
sought to control the politics of the 
nation, before we had national pro¬ 
hibition, were revealed by sworn 
testimony taken at the investigation 
conducted by the Senate Judiciary 
Committee of the 65th Congress in 


158 


The Annals of the American Academy 


1918. None but brewers, whisky 
dealers and their allies were called to 
the witness stand. Their offices had 
been raided by Government officials 
in cases involving alleged violations 
of the Federal Corrupt Practices Act. 
When the brewers and liquor dealers 
took the stand they were confronted by 
letters over their own signatures which 
caused them embarrassment and which 
made them admit in their answers a 
connection with the most vicious, 
corrupt system that ever cursed a 
self-governing people. The following 
summary of the findings of the Com¬ 
mittee are indicative of the political 
activities of the liquor interests: 

(a) That they have furnished large sums 
of money for the purpose of secretly con¬ 
trolling newspapers and periodicals. 

(b) That they have undertaken to and 
have frequently succeeded in controlling 
primaries, elections, and political organiza¬ 
tions. 

(c) That they have contributed enor¬ 
mous sums of money to political cam¬ 
paigns in violation of the federal statutes 
and the statutes of several of the states. 

(d) That they have exacted pledges 
from candidates for public office prior to 
the election. 

(e) That for the purpose of influencing 
public opinion they have attempted and 
partly succeeded in subsidizing the public 
press. 

(f) That to suppress and coerce persons 
hostile to and to compel support from 
them, they have resorted to an extensive 
system of boycotting unfriendly American 
manufacturing and mercantile concerns. 

(g) That they have created their own 
political organization in many states and 
in smaller political units, for the purpose of 
carrying into effect their own political will, 
and have financed the same with large 
contributions and assessments. 

(h) That with a view of using it for 
their own political purposes, they contrib¬ 
uted large sums of money to the German- 
American Alliance, many of the member¬ 
ship of which were disloyal and unpatriotic. 


(i) That they organized clubs, leagues, 
and corporations of various kinds for the 
purpose of secretly carrying on their polit¬ 
ical activities, without having their interest 
known to the public. 

(j) That they improperly treated the 
funds expended for political purposes as a 
proper expenditure of their business and 
consequently failed to return the same for 
taxation under the revenue laws of the 
United States. 

(k) That they undertook, through a 
cunningly conceived plan of advertising 
and subsidation, to control and dominate 
the foreign-language press of the United 
States. 

(l) That they have subsidized authors 
of recognized standing in literary circles to 
write articles of their selection for many 
standard periodicals. 

(m) That for many years a working 
agreement existed between the brewing and 
distilling interests of the country, by the 
terms of which the brewing interests con¬ 
tributed two thirds and the distilling in¬ 
terests one third of the political expendi¬ 
tures made by the joint interests. 

Preservation of Selfish Privilege 
Sole Purpose 

The present liquor interests of Eng¬ 
land are attempting to defeat the 
passage of the measure sponsored by 
Lady Astor, which seeks to do no more 
than to prohibit the sale of liquors to 
minors under eighteen years of age. 
In this country the liquor interests 
have contested politically every step 
to give any measure of police control 
over the traffic. They opposed Sun¬ 
day closing laws, laws to prohibit the 
sale of liquor to minors or at elections. 
When the people demanded local op¬ 
tion laws they were opposed as viola¬ 
tive of personal liberty. When local 
option was secured and the people 
demanded state prohibition, the liquor 
interests insisted that local option was 
the proper principle. Today we have 
national constitutional prohibition and 
the liquor interests and their support- 


159 


Politics in the Enforcement of the Liquor Laws 


ers are demanding that each state have 
the right to enforce the Amendment in 
its own way. Constitutional provi¬ 
sions or precedents have meant noth¬ 
ing in their fight for special privilege. 

When the measure was pending in 
Congress providing prohibition for the 
District of Columbia, the opponents 
of the measure insisted that the people 
of the District should have the right 
to vote on the question—that to out¬ 
law the saloons from the District, with¬ 
out giving the people an opportunity 
to express their views, was a serious 
violation of their inherent and con¬ 
stitutional rights—notwithstanding the 
Constitution of the United States 
does not provide for a vote by the 
people of the District upon any ques¬ 
tion. Congress could tax the citizens 
of the District without representation 
and little was heard about it. The 
boys of the District could be drafted 
and sent to France without any referen¬ 
dum and without any violation of 
personal liberty as guaranteed by the 
Constitution; but to prohibit the sale 
of liquor without the consent of the 
people was declared to be an unpardon¬ 
able offense. 

In Maryland when the liquor in¬ 
fluence dominated the Legislature, an 
amendment to the Constitution was 
adopted which provided a referendum 
under certain conditions. The liquor 
interests, however, expressly excepted 
from the operation of the referendum 
the right of the people to vote on any 
legislation affecting the liquor ques¬ 
tion. But in 1921, when the Legis¬ 
lature was considering a code for the 
enforcement of the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment, the opponents of prohibition in 
the state Senate insisted upon attach¬ 
ing an amendment to the code provid¬ 
ing a referendum in conflict with the 
spirit of the referendum amendment to 
the Constitution. This resulted in the 
rejection of the code by the House. 


In New York State in the enactment 
of the law providing for local option, 
certain special provisions and require¬ 
ments were made with reference to the 
city of New York, designed to make the 
possibility of a vote under the provi¬ 
sions of that act, by the people of the 
city, more difficult. The liquor in¬ 
terests in their political methods have 
been persistent in their purpose to pro¬ 
mote their selfish interests, though not 
at all times have they been constitu¬ 
tionally consistent. 

/ 

Revolt Against Liquor Domination 
of Politics 

One of the potent factors in bringing 
about national constitutional prohibi¬ 
tion was the growing resentment of the 
people against the political tactics of 
the licensed liquor traffic. There is 
scarcely a citizen of mature years and 
experience in civic affairs who does not 
remember the pernicious methods of 
the liquor interests. The people have 
not forgotten how elections were 
stolen through corruption of the 
election machinery, the padding of 
petitions by the addition of dead 
men’s names, the way in which the 
poll taxes of dissolute men were paid 
out of funds contributed by liquor 
dealers for that purpose and their 
votes cast at the dictates of the polit¬ 
ical bosses. In some instances, where 
restrictions upon the number of 
licensed places were imposed, they 
were evaded through the erection of 
apartment houses and the bringing in 
of additional persons to increase the 
total number residing within a given 
area. One of the contributing causes 
to the sentiment for national prohibi¬ 
tion, was the manner in which the liq¬ 
uor dealers in license states continued 
to ship liquors into “dry” states under 
the protection of the commerce clause 
of the Constitution. When the rep¬ 
resentatives of the “dry” states in Con- 


160 


The Annals of the American Academy 


gress were endeavoring to secure the 
passage of the Webb-Kenyon Act to 
enable them to better effect the pro¬ 
hibition policy of the people of their 
states, the liquor interests were polit¬ 
ically active in attempting to defeat it. 

The continuous attempt of the liquor 
interests to influence legislation in 
opposition to the will of the people, ex¬ 
pressed in most instances after a ref¬ 
erendum, and their utter disregard of 
any form of law which might be en¬ 
acted to regulate or control the traffic, 
gave rise to the view that it was a 
business which could not be regulated, 
but must be annihilated if its pernicious 
political activities were to be sup¬ 
pressed. 

Liquor Interests Still Active 

When the Eighteenth Amendment 
was adopted there w r ere, of course, 
many who believed that the liquor 
traffic was taken out of politics. While 
its influence has been very materially 
lessened, it has not been altogether 
destroyed. Just as the liquor trade 
corrupted the political life of the nation 
in an effort to maintain its legal ex¬ 
istence, it has continued its activities 
as an outlaw. Formerly it operated 
openly and boldly. Now it operates 
covertly. 

Approximately forty organizations 
have sprung into existence since the 
advent of national prohibition, all of 
which claim as their purpose political 
activity for the modification of the ex¬ 
isting law. It has been demonstrated 
that some of these organizations were 
formed to advance the financial inter¬ 
ests of the promoters through an appeal 
to the dissatisfied elements of our 
citizenship for funds and have no 
political strength. A few of them have 
unquestionably been organized for the 
bona fide purpose of expressing or¬ 
ganized political opposition to the pro¬ 
hibition policy. 


The principal one of these organiza¬ 
tions is the Association Against the 
Prohibition Amendment, which was 
active in a number of states during the 
recent congressional elections in an 
attempt to defeat members of Congress 
who had supported the existing prohi¬ 
bition laws. All of these organizations 
distinctly disavow any connection with 
the former liquor interests. Since the 
brew T ery interests would be the princi¬ 
pal beneficiaries under any liberaliza¬ 
tion of the prohibition law, it will be 
extremely difficult for these organiza¬ 
tions to prevent their activities from 
being used by the liquor interests for 
the futherance of their aims. In sev¬ 
eral instances, notably in Ohio and 
Wisconsin, former liquor organizations 
have been found working with them for 
the promotion of a common purpose. 
Congressman Clyde Kelly, of the 
Thirty-third Congressional District of 
Pennsylvania, recently said of the 
activities of the liquor interests in his 
district in their efforts to defeat him 
for reelection: 

In my own district I saw the power of the 
outlaws and the power of the people. The 
Allegheny County Liquor Dealers’ Associa¬ 
tion, whose very existence is an insulting 
challenge to the Constitution and laws of 
this country, officially indorsed my oppo¬ 
nent and supplied him with large sums of 
money, levied from license holders and 
bootleggers. Seventy-five thousand dol¬ 
lars was expended and every method known 
to polecat fighters was brought into use. 

The liquor interests of Europe are 
thoroughly aroused over the adoption 
of national prohibition by the United 
States. They realize that if the policy 
is a success in this country that it will 
only be a short time before similar legis¬ 
lation is demanded by the people there. 
Press dispatches from Europe indicate 
that the wine and liquor interests have 
recently perfected a strong association 
to combat prohibition. Reports are 


161 


Politics in the Enforcement of the Liquor Laws 


current that money will be expended in 
this country in the coining presidential 
campaign in an effort to influence the 
election on behalf of the European 
liquor interests. 

Political Methods of Opponents 
of Prohibition 

It would be unfair to say that all the 
personnel of the organizations now 
politically active against prohibition is 
connected with the liquor interests. 
Nevertheless, any liberalization of the 
law permitting the sale of beer or wine 
would redound chiefly to the benefit of 
the brewery and wine interests and they 
are, therefore, deeply concerned in the 
success of the campaign now being 
waged. The opponents of prohibition 
realize that it is practically impossible 
to repeal the Eighteenth Amendment. 
This would require a two-thirds vote of 
Congress and the approval of the legis¬ 
latures of three fourths of the states. 
Conscious of this, they propose a plan 
of political action which seeks to de¬ 
stroy the Constitution by indirection 
or nullification. 

The Association Against the Prohi¬ 
bition Amendment announces as its 
plan a three-fold object: First, to get 
the Volstead Act repealed; second, to 
permit every state to pass its own en¬ 
forcement act; third, to repeal the 
Eighteenth Amendment. Under our 
form of government a Constitution 
may be more effectively destroyed by 
legislative inaction than by legislation 
enacted in direct contravention of the 
Constitution. In the first case there 
is no recourse to the people except 
through the ballot box, while, if the leg¬ 
islative body passes a measure in direct 
violation of the Constitution, the courts 
will declare it unconstitutional and 
prevent the evil. Constitutional pro¬ 
visions of this character are not self¬ 
executing. They require legislation to 
make them effective. To repeal the 


act of Congress necessary to enforce the 
Amendment is to take a “short cut” 
method to frustrate the will of the 
people expressed in a constitutional 
mandate. It renders the Constitution 
meaningless, a “mere scrap of paper.” 
In his debate with Senator Douglas at 
Quincy, Illinois, on October 13, 1858, 
Abraham Lincoln thus characterized 
such methods. 

If you withhold that necessary legisla¬ 
tion for the support of the Constitution 
and constitutional rights, do you not com¬ 
mit perjury? I ask every sensible man, if 
that is not so? That is undoubtedly just 
so, say what you please. 

New York Reveals Nullification 

Plan 

The situation in New York at the 
present time discloses the methods em¬ 
ployed by the opposition. The legis¬ 
lature of the state recently repealed 
the law enacted by a former legislature 
for the enforcement of the Eighteenth 
Amendment. The repeal measure 
was signed by Governor Smith. This 
leaves the people of New York without 
any state law for the control of the 
liquor traffic. It did not restore the 
safeguards of the former license law, 
but left the people defenseless and at 
the mercies of the liquor interests, in 
so far as any protection from their 
state officers is concerned. The Gov¬ 
ernor very adroitly endeavored to 
make it appear that the law would be 
better enforced by the repeal of the 
state code since he insisted that state 
peace officers are required to appre¬ 
hend violators and turn them over 
to the federal courts, a contention 
which was denied in the very first 
instance in which the legal question 
arose. When Police Commissioner 
Enright requested an opinion of the 
Corporation Counsel as to whether 
peace officers of the city of New York 
were required to enforce the Eighteenth 


12 


162 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Amendment to the Constitution, he 
was advised that they were under a 
moral obligation to do so, but there 
was no enforcible legal obligation. 

The absurdity of the Governor's 
proposal, as a practical matter, is 
clearly apparent when the fact is con¬ 
sidered that the federal courts sit in 
only about fourteen places in the state. 
The suggestion that the law can be 
better enforced by the federal Gov¬ 
ernment, with approximately 250 fed¬ 
eral agents acting alone than by the 
joint cooperation of such agents with 
approximately 25,000 state peace 
officers, is equally without reason. 
His Excellency evidently has little 
confidence in the comparative effec¬ 
tiveness of the constabulary of the 
Empire State. 

The Association Against the Pro¬ 
hibition Amendment was actively at 
w 7 ork in New York in support of the 
repeal measure which left the state 
without any provision for the enforce¬ 
ment of the liquor Ltws by the state. 
According to its published program, it 
is equally as insistent upon the repeal 
of the Volstead Act by Congress. 
Combining these tw T o schemes, it is 
evident that the nation as w T ell as the 
state would have no form of prohibition 
if their program w r ere accomplished. 
Its ultimate object is as palpably a 
species of nullification of the Consti¬ 
tution of the United States as human 
ingenuity could devise. 

Beer and Wine Propaganda 

In Ohio during the last November 
election an aggressive effort was made 
to secure the ratification of an amend¬ 
ment to the Constitution of the state 
wffiich would legalize the sale of beer 
and w T ine. This measure was de¬ 
feated by 189,000 majority. Prac¬ 
tically in every congressional district 
in the United States, where it was felt 
that there was a chance of defeating a 


Congressman for reelection who had 
supported the Volstead Act, candidates 
favoring light wines and beer received 
the active support of the organizations 
opposed to prohibition. While there 
were considerable changes in the mem¬ 
bership of the House as between Re¬ 
publicans and Democrats, the relative 
strength of the so-called “wets" and 
“drys" remained the same. In this 
campaign the beer and w r ine candidates 
were endorsed by the Association 
Against the Prohibition Amendment. 

The activities of these organizations 
in their attacks upon prohibition 
afford a striking resemblance to the 
methods formerly employed by the 
organized liquor interests. They have 
a consistent purpose though no con¬ 
sistent method. In one state they 
agitate for the repeal of all laws to en¬ 
force the Constitution; in another they 
w 7 ork for beer and wine. The only 
logical conclusion to be drawn from 
their efforts is that they would restore 
the liquor business—by what means is 
immaterial—so long as it is restored. 

Liquor Influence in Political 
Appointments 

In many of the license states, at 
the time national prohibition became 
effective, the political machinery of 
the state w T as controlled by the liquor 
interests or their appointees. The 
creation of the offices of state prohibi¬ 
tion director and federal prohibition 
agents, with the large measure of con¬ 
trol placed in the hands of these offi¬ 
cials over the withdrawal of liquor in 
bond, afforded a tremendous opportu¬ 
nity for building a political machine and 
financing the political organizations 
through the acceptance of money for 
the improper issuance of permits for 
the withdrawal of liquors. Men were 
selected for appointment wdio w r ere 
absolutely out of sympathy with the 
law they w 7 ere called upon to execute 


Politics in the Enforcement of the Liquor Laws 


163 


and who were unqualified to dis¬ 
charge the duties imposed upon them. 
Many charges of corruption and graft 
were heard. Frequent changes in per¬ 
sonnel occurred. In some instances 
officials have been indicted, tried 
and convicted. This was natural 
in the attempt to inaugurate a new 
policy, but it was the liquor interests 
who were the corruptionists. These 
difficulties are rapidly being overcome 
as the work is being better systematized 
after experience and as the people are 
coming to demand that only men of 
ability and integrity be appointed to 
these positions. A striking illustra¬ 
tion of the improvement in this re¬ 
spect is found in the decreased with¬ 
drawals of liquors for non-beverage 
purposes. According to official fig¬ 
ures the withdrawals for 1920 were 
12,389,529 gallons, in 1921, 3,243,845, 
and in 1922, 1,819,888 gallons. This 
clearly indicates the better adminis¬ 
tration of this feature of the law. 

The survival of the influence of the 
liquor interests is not only manifested 
in the appointment of officials having 
duties directly connected with the en¬ 
forcement of the prohibitory law, but it 
also endeavors to influence the appoint¬ 
ment of men for judicial positions who 
are known to be of liberal tendencies 
and opposed to the policy instituted 
by the Eighteenth Amendment, also 
in the matter of the appointment of 
prosecuting attorneys and other offi¬ 
cials having an indirect connection 
with the enforcement of this law. 

Necessity for Taking the Matter 
Out of Politics 

The Eighteenth Amendment is a part 
of the fundamental law of the United 
States. It was adopted in a manner 
provided by the Constitution after a 
long period of discussion and experi¬ 
mentation upon the part of the people 
with state and local prohibition. Even 


its enemies admit that it is practically 
impossible to repeal the Amendment. 
As long as it is the law of the land it 
should be respected and obeyed by 
every loyal citizen and every official 
should be expected and required to en¬ 
force it. Irrespective of whether we 
believe in the wisdom of prohibition as 
a national policy, there is no alterna¬ 
tive save to support the Constitu¬ 
tion. 

* Prohibition enforcement must cease 
to be a political football. Enforcement 
officers should be placed under civil 
service. This would mean the estab¬ 
lishment of an enforcement corps, 
selected in the first instance upon the 
basis of qualification rather than upon 
political influence, and in which pro¬ 
motion would be dependent upon merit 
instead of “political pull.” Under 
the present system there is a new 
personnel with every change in the 
political complexion of the adminis¬ 
tration. The tenure of office is un¬ 
certain. As soon as an officer has ac¬ 
quired experience and becomes effi¬ 
cient, he may be dropped from the 
service because of varying political 
fortunes or to make way for a political 
favorite. Too little credit is given 
prohibition enforcement officers for 
their splendid accomplishments in the 
face of amazing political interference. 
Their task is difficult. They should 
be relieved of the present uncertain¬ 
ties and political embarrassments and 
given an opportunity to function as 
other agencies of the Government. 

If the policy of national constitu¬ 
tional prohibition is wrong, the people 
of the United States are possessed of 
the means of changing it through an 
amendment to the Constitution, but 
any plan which savors of evasion of the 
Constitution, through rendering it in¬ 
effective by nullification, indirection, 
or any other “short cut” method, 
should receive the utmost condem- 


164 


The Annals of the American Academy 


nation of every patriotic American. 
The surest way to determine whether 
this is a wise policy of government is 
to enforce it. It can best be effec¬ 
tively enforced only through the joint 
and cooperative action of the national 
and state governments in the honest 
exercise of the concurrent power 
provided by the Amendment for that 


purpose. The believers in this prin¬ 
ciple challenge the opposition to show 
their belief in a square deal by giving 
it a fair test. If it be given a fair test 
and fails, its supporters may be con¬ 
vinced of their lack of wisdom; but if 
instead they insist upon political prac¬ 
tices which savor of nullification the 
warfare must go on unceasingly. 



The Prohibition Law and the Political Machine 

By Imogen B. Oakley 

Chairman, Civil Service Division, General Federation Women’s Clubs 


S ENATOR REED of Pennsylvania 
recently addressed the members 
of the Union League of Philadelphia 
on the subject of the enforcement of 
the national prohibition law. The 
meeting was not open to the public, 
but from the reports in the press it is 
evident that he spoke with courageous 
frankness. He urged the men,—and 
his audience was exclusively masculine, 
—not to be hypocrites, not to uphold 
the Amendment in public and privately 
disregard it. “Give the law a fair 
chance,” he said. 

It has never had a fair chance. By 
exempting enforcement officers from 
the operation of the federal civil serv¬ 
ice law the Volstead Act turned them 
all over to political patronage and made 
enforcement a political game. 

As originally presented to Congress 
the Volstead Act conformed to the 
federal law. It was referred to the 
Judiciary Committee, where it was 
amended, and when resubmitted to 
the House the section relating to the 
civil service read as follows, the Amend¬ 
ment being the clauses in italics: 

Sec. 38. The Commissioner of Internal 
Revenue and the Attorney-General of the 
United States are hereby respectively 
authorized to appoint and employ such 
assistants, experts, clerks, and other em¬ 
ployees in the District of Columbia or else¬ 
where , and to purchase such supplies and 
equipment as they may deem necessary for 
the enforcement of the provisions of this 
Act, but such assistants, experts, and 
other employees, except such executive offi¬ 
cers as may be appointed by the Commissioner 
or the Attorney-General to have immediate 
direction of the enforcement of the provisions 
of this Act , and persons aidhorized to issue 
permits , and agents and inspectors in the 


field service, shall be appointed under the 
rules and regulations prescribed by the 
Civil Service Act. 

Why Amendment was Supported 

This Amendment, it will be ob¬ 
served, leaves only the minor clerk¬ 
ships and routine positions in the 
classified service and makes all the 
administrative officers, those upon 
whom must rest the burden and re¬ 
sponsibility of enforcement, open to 
political patronage. It is difficult to 
read the minds of congressmen, but it 
would appear that those who voted for 
the Amendment did so either because 
they believed in the spoils system and 
were not ill-pleased that so large a 
number of financial plums would be 
available for distribution among their 
followers, or because they were con¬ 
vinced that to accept the Act as 
amended was the only way to com¬ 
mand the two-thirds majority neces¬ 
sary to pass it over the President’s 
veto. 

To those who supported the Amend¬ 
ment for the latter reason, two courses 
were open: they could do violence to 
their convictions and vote for the 
exemption clause, or they could appeal 
to public opinion to come to the rescue 
of the Act as originally drawn. Pub¬ 
lic opinion had forced the Eighteenth 
Amendment to the Constitution and 
there was every reason to believe 
that, were the question fairly and 
squarely put to it, the same irresistible 
force would compel Congress to pass 
an enforcement bill in harmony with 
the federal civil service act. But to 
get an act of Congress by pressure of 
public opinion is a tedious process, 


166 


The Annals of the American Academy 


whereas to accept the exemption 
clause was to ensure the prompt enact¬ 
ment of a necessary enforcement bill. 
The advocates of prompt action pre¬ 
vailed, the Volstead Act as amended 
was adopted by a majority of the 
House and Senate, and was passed 
over the President’s veto by a decisive 
number of votes. 

Drunkard a State Liability 

The claim of the opponents of the 
Eighteenth Amendment and the Vol¬ 
stead Act that both were forced upon 
the country by a political trick, shows 
slight appreciation of what has been 
happening in the United States during 
the last fifty years. Nothing in our 
history is more remarkable than the 
steady growth of the prohibition 
movement. Beginning as a moral 
movement, it has become economic, 
social and political. The drunken 
man who neglects and abuses his 
family is the primary and sustaining 
cause of prohibition sentiment. The 
poverty and brutal treatment which 
the wives and children of alcoholic 
addicts have to endure has seemed 
reason enough for the demand that 
the trade in intoxicating licpior should 
be forbidden. 

But the alcoholic addict is not only 
a menace to the family, he is a liability 
to the state. He necessitates police 
courts, jails and prisons which must 
be sustained at the expense of the sober 
and thrifty. Hospitals must be pro¬ 
vided to care for his self-imposed dis¬ 
eases, and asylums to minister to the 
needs of his children weakened phys¬ 
ically and mentally by his excesses. 
Employers of labor have learned that 
the man who drinks is undependable 
as a workman. Hands and brain are 
unsteady under the influence of alco¬ 
hol. The Pennsylvania Railroad de¬ 
cided years ago that in the interests of 
public safety every man in its employ 


must be a total abstainer. Other 
great corporations actuated by the 
same motives adopted the same rules. 
The man who drinks cannot be sure of 
regular employment. He becomes an 
actual or potential charge upon the 
community, and economic as well as 
moral reasons call for the suppression 
of the trade in intoxicating liquor. 

Sinister Political Power of Saloon 

We have been slow as a people to 
realize that the man who drinks is a 
source of corruption in our political 
life, but at last we are fully awake to 
the fact that the saloon that caters to 
his tastes is a sinister power in politics. 
It provides him a social and political 
club house. The city and county 
committees of his political party meet 
in its back parlor. Candidates for 
office are nominated in its barroom. I 
knew a teacher in the public schools of 
my city who, when she wished to con¬ 
sult the most influential of her direc¬ 
tors, had to seek him in his saloon. 
He was coarse and illiterate, but he was 
a school director by virtue of the votes 
of the men who frequented his bar. 
Not so many years ago, a committee 
from a prominent woman's organiza¬ 
tion in Philadelphia waited upon a 
ward boss, and asked his assistance 
in having two women placed upon his 
ward school board. The boss, a liq¬ 
uor dealer, was most affable. “Ask 
me anything but that,” he said, “and 
I will try to accommodate you; but I 
need my school directors. They do 
all my dirty work.” 

No one denies that the Liquor 
Dealers’ Association controls, or did 
control, legislation in several of our 
states, and it has been often asserted 
and not infrequently believed that 
Congress has done the bidding of the 
Whisky Ring. Public opinion has 
become convinced that the saloon and 
its supporters are a corrupting force 


The Prohibition Law and the Political Machine 


167 


in our political and social life and for 
that reason alone, laying aside all other 
arguments, the manufacture and sale 
of intoxicating liquor must be for¬ 
bidden throughout the United States. 

Impetus to “Dry” Movement 
by War 

Those who persist in regarding the 
Eighteenth Amendment as the result 
of a political trick have forgotten that 
thirty-two states were “dry” by legisla¬ 
tive enactment and referendum be¬ 
fore the passage of the Amendment. 
Dry sentiment was growing and “dry” 
territory expanding, and it had be¬ 
come probable that all the states, 
excepting the ones containing the 
largest cities, would sooner or later 
join the “dry ” column, when the World 
War gave a sudden impetus to the 
prohibition movement. Military au¬ 
thorities discovered that the man 
who drinks is no more dependable as a 
soldier than as a workman, and Con¬ 
gress decreed that the American Army 
should be “ dry”. The immediate pop¬ 
ular response was: “If to be a good 
soldier one must forswear wine and 
whisky, it must be equally true that 
to be a good citizen one must 
relinquish both”; and a spontaneous 
outburst of patriotic sentiment re¬ 
strained our people from indulging in 
what was forbidden to our men in the 
trenches. 

Shortly after prohibition had been 
decreed for the Army, I happened to 
be lunching at a popular country club. 
At a near-by table was a gay party 
who had ordered cocktails. One 
woman turned down her glass. “Are 
you a blue ribbon?” she was asked. 
“I am not thinking of any blue ribbon,” 
she answered; “I am thinking that I 
do not want what our soldiers are not 
allowed to have.” “You are right,” 
cried the whole party, men and women 


alike, and the cocktail order was 
countermanded. 

It was the continuance of this feeling 
that gave the Volstead Act, for a time, 
general support and obedience. Its 
first successes disarmed criticism. 
Saloons disappeared. Drunken men 
vanished from the streets. Hospitals 
reported vacant beds in their alco¬ 
holic wards. Police courts showed a 
steady diminution in petty crimes. 
Wardens of jails pointed to empty 
cells. Small deposits in savings banks 
reached hitherto unknown figures. 
Social workers returned from their 
visits to the tenement districts with 
reports of happier homes. The money 
that had gone to enrich the saloon was 
putting better food on the tables and 
better clothing on the children. 

It fell to my lot to speak in college 
settlements to many audiences of tene¬ 
ment women on the duties and privi¬ 
leges of citizenship, and the invariable 
request from the women was: “Tell 
us how to vote ‘dry’. We don’t know 
much about government or laws, but 
we want to be sure to vote ‘dry’.” 
And when I have asked them why they 
wanted to vote “dry” they answered: 
“Because we have boys to raise and 
because we have been so much happier 
and more comfortable since the country 
went ‘dry’.” 

The “Wets” in Again 

But the war ended; the soldiers re¬ 
turned; men and women began to go 
about their pre-war business; and a 
reaction to the patriotic fervor that 
had given such loyal support to the 
prohibition law became more and more 
perceptible. The “wets” began to re¬ 
assert themselves. They asked why 
wine and beer should not be allowed. 
Here and there, prominent citizens, 
ordinarily law-abiding, did not hesitate 
to express their dislike of the law and 
their intention to disregard it. Many 


168 


The Annals of the American Academy 


conformed to it publicly but drank 
freely in their clubs and their social 
gatherings. The gilded youth of so¬ 
ciety boasted of the contents of their 
hip flasks. The bootlegger showed his 
sinister figure. “Hooch” was on sale 
for every one who knew where to look 
for it. Police courts soon reported 
an increase of “drunks.” Alcoholic 
wards in hospitals again filled up. 
Prohibition enforcement agents, ap¬ 
pointed by political influence for par¬ 
tisan reasons, allied themselves with 
bootleggers and made fortunes from 
the sale of confiscated whisky. 

The Graham and McConnell Cases 

Mr. Frederick Wile, who conducted 
for the Philadelphia Public Ledger an 
investigation into the prohibition situa¬ 
tion in New York, New Jersey, Penn¬ 
sylvania, Maryland and Ohio, reported 
in 1922 that he had found in each of 
those states “a combination of boot¬ 
leggers, financiers and politicians” 
who have adopted the methods of the 
Liquor Dealers’ Association and have 
succeeded to that Association’s in¬ 
fluence and power. The business of 
the politician is to see that “suitable” 
enforcement agents are appointed with 
whom the financiers and bootleggers 
can safely transact their business. 
Agents who decline to act with the 
“combination” soon find themselves 
out of a job. 

Mr. Wile cites several instances in 
proof of his statement and among 
them the Graham case of New York. 
Mr. Arthur G. Graham was appointed 
assistant to the chief enforcement 
officer of New York City, his special 
business being to investigate applica¬ 
tions for basic permits and renewals of 
permits. He was soon cautioned by 
his superior officer that less zeal would 
be desirable, and the congressman, 
through whose influence he was ap¬ 
pointed, told him personally that it 


would be wiser to act with the other 
agents. He failed to heed these ad¬ 
monitions, and barely six months after 
his appointment he was dismissed, 
and the only cause for dismissal that 
he was ever able to learn was that 
he had been “a square peg in a round 
hole.” 

The McConnell case in Pennsylvania 
is a recent and conspicuous example of 
the immunity enjoyed by an agent who 
stands in with the “combination.” 
McConnell was made chief enforce¬ 
ment officer for Pennsylvania through 
the influence of the late Senator Pen¬ 
rose. Mr. Penrose was a life-long 
advocate of the spoils system and 
never attempted to disguise the fact 
that he was “wet” in theory and prac¬ 
tice. No one expected that one of his 
appointees would be especially ardent 
in enforcing the law, but an astute 
and conscientious Assistant District 
Attorney soon was led to suspect some¬ 
thing more than mere non-enforcement. 
He did some quiet detective work and 
in due season was able to report to the 
Department of Justice in Washington 
that he had in his hands the proof of a 
conspiracy to defraud the Government, 
and was ready to lay it before the 
Grand Jury. The Department coun¬ 
seled delay and again delay. The 
matter had been pending for six 
months, and the Assistant District 
Attorney notified the Department 
that any further procrastination would 
be prejudicial to the case and that he 
intended to lay his evidence against 
the Director and some forty-eight 
other persons before the Grand Jury 
at once. The response from the 
Attorney-General was a request for 
his resignation. The District At¬ 
torney, spurred by public opinion and 
using the evidence collected by his late 
assistant, secured an indictment charg¬ 
ing McConnell together with forty- 
eight others with conspiracy. 


The Prohibition Law and the Political Machine 


169 


After a year the case was brought to 
trial. Three of the conspirators be¬ 
coming frightened pleaded guilty and 
threw themselves on the mercy of the 
court. The trial was halted by a 
charge that an attempt had been made 
to fix the foreman of the jury. The 
jury was discharged, a new jury se¬ 
lected, and the trial proceeded for a 
week. It early became manifest that 
the case was going to break down. 
Material documentary evidence dis¬ 
appeared. Witnesses who at one 
time had testified freely had lost their 
memories. Most important of all, 
it was discovered that the indictment 
was fatally defective. 

Finally, the court announced that it 
would direct the jury to return a ver¬ 
dict of not guilty, stating as it did so 
that “There is evidence of fraudulent 
permits having been issued. There is 
evidence of the unlawful withdrawal 
of whisky. There is evidence of un¬ 
lawful transportation of whisky,” but 
the jury cannot convict “on this in¬ 
dictment that is before you.” One 
of the jurors remarked after the court's 
direction, “It is a disgrace to the 
United States Government to allow 
those men to go free.” The defend¬ 
ants left the court technically innocent 
men. 

The Philadelphia papers call the 
acquittal of McConnell a national 
scandal and disgrace and the most 
sinister event in the history of the 
state, and they all unite in demanding 
that the whole prohibition service be 
taken out of politics. President 
Harding in his Denver speech joined 
his voice to this demand. He said: 

Unless the question (of prohibition) be 
definitely removed from the domain of 
political action, it will continue a demoral¬ 
izing element in our whole political life. 
It will be the means of encouraging 
disrespect for many laws. It will bring 
disrepute upon our community and be 


pointed to as justifying the charge that 
we are a nation of hypocrites. There can 
be no issue in this land paramount to 
that of enforcement of the law. 

The National Civil Service Reform 
League protested against the exemption 
clause in the Volstead Act from the 
minute it was first presented to Con¬ 
gress, on the ground that it would be¬ 
come a source of political corruption, 
and of this clause, Mr. Richard Henry 
Dana, president of the League, said: 
“It will create a political, partisan 
force, sure, as long experience shows, 
to be incompetent, blind-eyed and 
black-mailing.” 

Government Agent of Professedly 
Inferior Type 

On June 30, 1922, the number of 
employees in the prohibition unit was 
2132. The number of dismissals from 
this group from June 30, 1921, to June 
30, 1922, w r ere 120, or approximately 
6 per cent of the whole force; and the 
grounds for dismissal, according to the 
report of the Bureau of Internal Rev¬ 
enue, were conduct unbecoming an 
officer, extortion, acceptance of bribes, 
falsifying accounts, and general in¬ 
efficiency. This 6 per cent may, in 
fairness, be doubled to include the 
inefficient and corrupt officials who 
have been able to retain their posi¬ 
tions through the same political in¬ 
fluence which obtained them. It may 
be claimed that 12 per cent is a small 
proportion to yield to the temptations 
spread before them by the bootlegging 
fraternity, but it is large enough to 
bring discredit upon the prohibition 
cause and it is quite large enough to 
make possible grave indictments by 
grand juries and to furnish court evi¬ 
dence that undermines the public 
respect for law and order. 

The presentment of the Federal 
Grand Jury of New York for March, 


170 


The Annals of the American Academy 


1921, conveys that jury’s opinion on 
the subject. It says: 

Members of the Grand Jury have been 
strongly impressed by the facts, almost 
without exception, that the agents who 
have appeared before us are not men of the 
type, intelligence, and character qualified 
to be charged with the enforcement of this 
difficult and important federal law. . . 

Their testimony has been such as to indi¬ 
cate a looseness and personal inefficiency 
which should be called to the official at¬ 
tention of the head of the Federal Prohibi¬ 
tion Department of New York City. We 
believe that, unless the branch of the Gov¬ 
ernment charged with enforcement of this 
law is to be brought into disrepute, the 
standard of the personnel of these agents 
will have to be raised. 

The Federal Grand Jury that began 
the investigation into the prohibition 
situation in New York about the middle 
of September, 1922, sent on October 
27 to Presiding Justice John E. Foster 
of the United States District Court a 
letter which speaks its opinion even 
more frankly than did its predecessor 
of 1921. The letter states that the 
affairs of the Federal Prohibition 
Director for the state of New York 
have been managed in 

an inefficient and disgraceful manner. 
Apparently, the agents selected for the 
active work of suppressing illegal traffic in 
whisky have been chosen principally for 
political reasons. . . . These ap¬ 

pointees being exempt from civil service 
laws were appointed and removed without 
the restrictions wnich those laws impose 
and consequently the office (of Federal Pro¬ 
hibition Director) seems to have been 
made the dumping ground for influential 
politicians who secured appointments for 
their henchmen without proper regard 
for the qualifications of those chosen. 
In one instance, an agent committed a 
serious violation of departmental regula¬ 
tions which was of such a character that 
he should have been promptly dismissed, 
but he was retained and remained in the 
service until the Grand Jury investigation 
now in progress was instituted. 


To this official testimony may be 
added the personal experience of a 
member of the National League of 
Women Voters who happened to be 
called to serve on the jury of the fed¬ 
eral court in Philadelphia. “I had 
looked forward,” she told me, “to the 
opportunity of aiding in the conviction 
of some notorious bootlegger, but the 
Government agents who were the 
prosecutors were so ill-prepared with 
their evidence, so plainly doubtful of 
their case, so generally indifferent 
and inefficient that in simple justice 
I had to vote to acquit the prisoners.” 

Non-amalgamation of Aliens 

The political influence which ap¬ 
points grafting agents, protects boot¬ 
leggers, and corrupts courts, finds a 
powerful support in our alien popula¬ 
tion. Our experience during the war 
disclosed conditions that otherwise we 
might not have realized for another 
generation. We discovered among us 
what are practically colonies of foreign 
peoples who are not assimilated and 
have no desire to become assimilated. 
We found five millions of foreign birth 
who cannot read, write, nor speak 
the English language. If naturalized, 
and we have pressed naturalization 
upon them with the naive idea that 
the mere process of taking out papers 
will transmute an ignorant alien into 
an intelligent citizen, they call them¬ 
selves, not Americans, but German- 
Americans, Irish-Americans, Italian- 
Americans, Greek-Americans, Polisli- 
Americans, or whatever other prefix 
may denote the nationality to which 
they cling. They live in groups, each 
group retaining its own national 
speech, prejudices and racial antag¬ 
onisms. A settlement worker of long 
experience in the tenement districts of 
a great city tells me that the various 
national groups within the radius of 
her settlement influence can no longer 


The Prohibition Law and the Political Machine 


171 


come together in harmony. She has 
to arrange one meeting for the Ital¬ 
ians, one for the Slavs, one for the 
Russian Jews, one for the Irish, and 
one for every other nationality to 
which the settlement is able to offer 
its hospitality. She despairs of the 
melting-pot since the representatives 
of each race maintain their prejudices 
and decline to mingle with the others. 
Each group appears to believe that 
America exists for it alone and tries to 
monopolize the privileges of the set¬ 
tlement and the city. The Irish try 
to elbow out the Jews, the Italians, 
the Slavs. They unite only in their 
opposition to the negro. 

Our Melting-Pot a Misnomer 

The American melting-pot today 
contains a supersaturated solution 
and insoluble lumps are floating on its 
surface. These insoluble lumps of 
unassimilated and unassimilable peo¬ 
ples are “wet” by heredity and habit. 
They come from wine-drinking nations 
and, ignorant of our language and 
laws, they see no reason why as citi¬ 
zens of what they understand is a 
“free country” they should not manu¬ 
facture, sell and use the liquor to 
which they are accustomed. They 
vote as racial groups and seek to im¬ 
pose their racial views on Congress 
and state legislatures. The German- 
American Alliance may or may not be 
such a racial group, but we know its 
activities during the war put it under 
suspicion. We still remember that 
the late Kaiser boasted in 1908 that in 
the United States “three million voters 
do my bidding at the presidential 
elections,” and that some racial organ¬ 
ization must have directed their votes. 
In the Italian Parliament references 
have been made to “our colonies in 
North America,” and when the United 
States Government asks for the re¬ 
lease from compulsory military service 


in Italy of a boy born in the United 
States of Italian-born parents, the 
Italian Government gives him up, not 
as an American citizen, but as a spe¬ 
cial courtesy to a friendly nation. In 
all our great cities, politicians recog¬ 
nize the power of these racial groups 
and emphasize the hyphen by appeal¬ 
ing to the German-American vote, 
the Irish-American vote, the Italian- 
American vote, that which is simply 
American being apparently a negligible 
quantity and of negligible value. 

New York is a foreign city that hap¬ 
pens to be in America. Only 5 per 
cent of its six million inhabitants can 
point to grandparents born in this 
country. On a test vote it would 
probably go “wet” by a majority as 
large as its excess of foreign population. 
Philadelphia, often cited as an Amer¬ 
ican’ community, is 60 per cent foreign 
and growing more foreign every day. 
Chicago is another New York. It 
was in that city, in 1921, that thou¬ 
sands of German-Americans paraded 
under a banner demanding “personal 
liberty,” meaning the liberty to run 
saloons and manufacture beer in op¬ 
position to the will of the American 
people as expressed in the Eighteenth 
Amendment of the Constitution. It 
is stated by those who ought to know 
that 75 per cent of the bootleggers are 
aliens. Italians and Russian Jews 
predominate, and one who reads the 
names of McConnell’s forty-eight fel¬ 
low conspirators will find striking sup¬ 
port of this statement. Many East 
Siders of New York are wearing dia¬ 
monds and riding in automobiles on 
the profits of illicit whisky, and the 
Slavs and South-Europeans brought 
over to work in the coal and iron fields 
of Pennsylvania find it easier and more 
profitable to make and sell “hooch” 
than to toil twelve hours a day in the 
steel mills. Those employers who 
are demanding that the immigration 


172 


The Annals of the American Academy 


bars be lowered would do well to ask 
themselves: Where would be the ad¬ 
vantage of a flood of cheap labor if 
that labor prefers bootlegging to work¬ 
ing in mines and mills? 

Public Opinion 

But, despite the growing numbers 
of violators of the law and the scan¬ 
dals that have attended its adminis¬ 
tration, there is no evidence that the 
nation as a whole has any desire to 
repeal the Eighteenth Amendment. 
No one of the thirty-two states that 
were “ dry ” before the Amendment was 
added to the written law of the land 
has given any indication of being will¬ 
ing to deliver itself again into the 
power of the Liquor Dealers’ Associa¬ 
tion. 

Public opinion is still in favor of 
total prohibition, but it has come to 
recognize the strength of the three 
great obstacles which I have enumer¬ 
ated in detail: 

(1) the political administration of 
the law, made possible by the exemp¬ 
tion clause in the Volstead Act; 

(2) the influence of our alien popu¬ 
lation; and 

(3) the decline in law-abiding senti¬ 
ment, which permits American men 
who call themselves good citizens to 
prefer a private indulgence to the 
good of the whole community. 

The most serious obstacle is the 
first, for it is the politically appointed 
enforcement agent who, by his own 
violation of the law and his alliance 
with bootleggers, is responsible for the 
demoralizing belief that the Govern¬ 
ment is playing politics and that pro¬ 
hibition is a political game. 

No one claims that to put enforce¬ 
ment officers under civil service rules 
would make them all incorruptible 
saints, but to do it would be a formal 
announcement by the Government 
that there is to be an honest endeavor 


to eliminate politics from the prohibi¬ 
tion service, and that no politician, 
however influential, is to stand behind 
a grafting agent or get between an 
honest agent and his duty. 

Sterling-Lehlbach Bill 

Promptly on the passage of the Vol¬ 
stead Act over the President’s veto, 
the National Civil Service Reform 
League prepared a bill to nullify the 
exempting clause and place enforce¬ 
ment officers in the classified service, 
and with the cooperation of Senator 
Sterling, chairman of the Senate Com¬ 
mittee on Retrenchment and Civil 
Service Reform, and Representative 
Lehlbach, chairman of the House Com¬ 
mittee on the Reform of the Civil 
Service, it was brought before both 
Houses of Congress. It w T as endorsed 
by the General Federation of Women’s 
Clubs and the National League of 
Women Voters, but when the Sixty- 
seventh Congress finally adjourned, it 
had not been reported out of com¬ 
mittee. The bootlegging industry of 
the country was lined up against it, 
but its most formidable opponents 
were Mr. Volstead and the Anti- 
Saloon League. Mr. Volstead’s op¬ 
position was natural. He was the 
author of the bill and his public words 
and actions show him to be a supporter 
of the spoils system. 

Mr. Wayne B. Wheeler, counsel for 
the Anti-Saloon League, objected to 
the Sterling-Lehlbach Bill for a variety 
of reasons which can be narrowed down 
to two: First, it is vitally necessary 
that every enforcement agent be “ dry” 
by conviction and in practice and 
under an impersonal civil service law 
there can be no guarantee that this 
requirement will be fulfilled; and 
second, that enforcement agents who 
show themselves inefficient or corrupt 
must be discharged at once, and under 
the civil service law it is extremely 


The Prohibition Law and the Political Machine 


173 


difficult, if not impossible, to get rid 
promptly of an unsatisfactory em¬ 
ployee. 

One is tempted to retort, are all en¬ 
forcement agents “dry” now, and have 
all inefficient and dishonest agents 
been promptly discharged? But dis¬ 
missing that temptation, the advocates 
of the Sterling-Lehlbaeh Bill have a 
conclusive answer to both objections. 

(1) Every candidate for office in the 
classified service must prove his fitness 
for that office, and the most essential 
elements of fitness are belief in the law 
to be administered and the intention 
to obey it. Moreover, every candi¬ 
date is required to give the names of 
five well-known reputable citizens who 
will certify that the said candidate is, 
according to the best of their knowledge 
and belief, an honest and trustworthy 
man, and it is highly improbable that 
with this requirement any ex-saloon 
keeper, ex-criminal, or any man known 
to be “wet” in his habits, could 
qualify. 

(2) The federal civil service law is 
very explicit in its statement that any 
inefficient, dishonest, or otherwise un¬ 
satisfactory employee may be dis¬ 
charged at once and without appeal. 
The head of any bureau or office is 
distinctly authorized to dismiss any 
offending employee on the spot, the 
only proviso being that the reasons for 
dismissal must be given in writing and 
must be neither political nor religious. 
In point of fact, it is only in the classi¬ 
fied service that an unsatisfactory 
employee can be promptly dismissed. 
Under the system of political patron¬ 
age, no man with a pull can be gotten 
rid of so long as his pull holds good. 

The state of the prohibition unit 
under political patronage was clearly 
expressed by a chief enforcement agent 
in my own city, when I once asked 
him what he could do to close up the 
still of a “hooch” vendor. 


“Very little,” he replied, “I am badly 
handicapped. One third of my subor¬ 
dinates are untrained and incapable. 
They have no idea how to make a report 
and I cannot rely upon any information 
they bring me. Another third, I have 
reason to believe, are ex-saloon keepers 
and ex-bar tenders, whose object is to make 
the law unpopular and incidentally fill 
their own pockets. The remaining third 
are dependable men, but, with only one 
third of my force really available, I cannot 
do more than one third of my work. And 
the worst of it is, that I am compelled to 
take every man, no matter how incapable, 
who is sent by an influential politician, 
and I dare not discharge any man, no 
matter how inefficient, if he has an in¬ 
fluential politician behind him.” And 
then he added, “I used to be lukewarm 
over civil service rules but now I am red- 
hot.” 

Mr. Wheeler, himself, notwith¬ 
standing his opposition to the Sterling- 
Lehlbaeh Bill, has publicly admitted 
the lamentable results of the political 
control of the prohibition unit. In 
“Current Opinion ” he writes: 

Political influence has been a great 
barrier to efficient enforcement. Many 
officers and agents in the Law Enforcement 
Department were appointed through po¬ 
litical influence quite apart from any in¬ 
terest in prohibition. The incoming ad¬ 
ministration can increase the efficiency of 
the Department ... by removing 
the drones and derelicts who were put there 
by political influence. 

The Sterling-Lehlbaeh Bill, or its 
equivalent, will undoubtedly be 
brought promptly before the next 
Congress, but no one is daring enough 
to prophesy whether it will receive the 
approval of our national lawmakers, 
whether, like its predecessor, it will be 
decently interred in committee, or 
whether it will be permitted to linger 
on the calendar as a continual subject 
for emotional oratory. 


174 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Ridiculous Inconsistencies! 

The debates in the last Congress, 
whenever prohibition enforcement was 
under discussion, offered a wealth 
of material to writers of comic opera. 
Only the authors of The Mikado and 
Pinafore could do justice to the divert¬ 
ing inconsistencies of senators and 
representatives. Mr. Volstead with 
his supporters, who we must believe 
are conscientiously “dry,” stood firm for 
his Act which is actually “wet,” since 


by its exemption clause it gives politi¬ 
cal protection to bootleggers and 
grafting agents. Mr. Lehlbach, a 
“wet,” and a vigorous opponent of the 
Volstead Act, led the forces in favor 
of the Sterling-Lehlbach Bill, which 
would strengthen the Act and make 
it effectively “dry.” 

No one can claim that the Volstead 
Act as it exists today is effectively 
“dry”; neither can it be said to be 
effectively “wet.” There is only one 
word to describe it. It is amphibious! 


Laborers in Heat and in Heavy Industries 

By Florence Kelley 

General Secretary, National Consumers’ League 


I WRITE as a prohibitionist con¬ 
vinced that the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment will never be formally repealed 
but will last as long as the Constitu¬ 
tion. But I am deeply concerned lest 
it suffer such annulment as has be¬ 
fallen the Fifteenth Amendment in the 
Southern states, and befalls Article II 
of the Constitution during and long 
after every war. I am, therefore, grate¬ 
ful for this opportunity to point out, 
though it is neither new nor original, 
one means of making friends for the 
Eighteenth Amendment which seems to 
have been neglected hitherto. I refer 
to the systematic provision of attrac¬ 
tive, refreshing substitute drinks for 
working people who are exposed to 
excessively high temperatures by the 
climate, or by the nature of their em¬ 
ployment, or who suffer thirst by 
reason of their own hard physical la¬ 
bor, with or without the other two 
influences. Prohibition has sharply 
accentuated a long struggle of wage 
earners of the most varied character 
for an elementary human right—the 
right to replace, as needed, the fluid 
which they exhaust at their work. 

Proper Drinking Water Facilities 
Difficult to Enforce 

In standardized industries, where 
the importance is recognized of keeping 
the labor turnover down and the regu¬ 
lar attendance of the working force up, 
drinking water does not normally come 
up for discussion between employers 
and employed. It is supplied as a 
matter of course. These are, however, 
unhappily, a vanishing minority of the 
great total of American industries. 
Employments which involve over¬ 


powering heat and prolonged extreme 
physical exertion are not standardized. 
They are socially subnormal. A 
single exception to this statement is, 
perhaps, the work of locomotive engi¬ 
neers in the hot months in the hot 
regions of our country. The demand 
for sustained attention is, in itself, a 
severe strain. The locomotive engi¬ 
neers, however, have in some measure 
standardized their industry and largely 
control the conditions under which 
they work. 

Back in the ’80’s, the industrially 
developed states were beginning to in¬ 
sert in their labor laws a provision that 
employers must supply sufficient, 
accessible, wholesome drinking water. 
But the workers found it permanently 
difficult to enforce this law, especially 
those who had no trade organizations. 
In the Atlantic coast cities and some 
others, torrid summers made this a 
recurring grievance. Local boards of 
health lost golden opportunities to 
gain the respect and lasting good will 
of multitudes of honest folk by seeing 
to it that they had good water to drink. 
So, alas, did the temperance forces, by 
failing to bring to bear their power in 
the community in support of so obvi¬ 
ous and feasible a health measure. 

Conditions Thirty Years Ago 

My own first personal contact with 
human suffering and ruin due to the 
absence of attractive, wholesome bever¬ 
ages available for men and boys sub¬ 
jected to the double strain of heat and 
hard labor, was nearly thirty years 
ago, in the winter of 1894 and 1895. 
As Chief State Factory Inspector of 
Illinois, I visited with two deputy 

175 


176 


The Annals of the American Academy 


inspectors the great glass bottle works 
at Alton. One of the most vivid 
memories of my life is the picture of 
more than a hundred gnomelike fig¬ 
ures of little boys, some crouching at 
the feet of the bottle blowers, opening 
and shutting molds in front of the 
fierce glare of the glass ovens; others 
running from that terrible heat, carry¬ 
ing bottles to the annealing ovens at 
the circumference of the building. The 
blowers’ ovens were heated with coal 
and filled with sand melted to suit the 
blower and his blow pipe. The boys, 
as we learned the next day in their 
homes, were from seven years old up. 
The hour was nearly two o’clock in a 
bitter morning in early January. 
When the night shift closed at two, 
the children went with the men under 
whom they worked, across the street 
to the grog shops (this was the cus¬ 
tomary name in Alton) and drank the 
poison sold there—some of the little 
boys paying for their drink and some 
emptying the dregs of the men’s glasses. 

The heat to which the boys’ growing 
frames were daily exposed was appall¬ 
ing. Pneumonia, tuberculosis and 
rheumatism were their characteristic 
industrial diseases, as we learned in¬ 
cidentally in their homes. 

These, however, were not what 
shocked the authorities of the city to 
whom we turned for help for the il¬ 
legally employed, who had to be dis¬ 
missed because the new child labor law 
prohibited the employment of children 
below the age of fourteen years in 
manufacture. What horrified the 
prosperous citizens of Alton was the 
profanity, the obscenity, the drunken¬ 
ness, the “general toughness” of the 
“glassworks’ boys.” But no one pro¬ 
vided any satisfying non-alcoholic 
beverages within the reach of their 
purses, or their homes, or their work¬ 
place, within the hours of the night 
shift at the works. 


Nothing But “Grog” or Water 

My next encounter with the fatal 
dearth of wholesome beverages for men 
was in an industry necessitating both 
hot and heavy labor. This was in 
1907, as a participant in the work of the 
Pittsburgh Survey conducted by Paul 
Kellogg and published by the Sage 
Foundation. Among a multitude of 
examples, the outstanding one was a 
factory producing a world-renowned 
metal product requiring exposure to 
heat well-nigh unbearable. The man¬ 
ager was a Scotchman, a teetotaler, 
filled with angry disgust for the drunk¬ 
enness and lack of thrift of his em¬ 
ployees. Indignantly he pointed to a 
city block, facing his own entrance, and 
occupied exclusively by low saloons, 
almost one for each of the nationali¬ 
ties to be found in the works. 

“There,” he said, “that’s where their 
earnings go. Instead of buying homes in 
the building and loan associations, and 
living like Americans, they loafe in those 
groggeries and sleep in bunks in lodging 
houses, three eight-hour shifts of sleepers 
for every bunk, and all known kinds of 
vermin in common.” 

As I listened in the overpowering 
dizzying heat, suffering myself from 
thirst, I made bold to ask—remember¬ 
ing the boys in the Alton glassworks— 
what else was available for his men. 
“One of the finest Artesian wells in the 
United States,” was his complacent 
answer, “and the water some of the 
coldest and most refreshing.” The 
scene and the self-satisfied employer’s 
preposterous reply stand out as though 
they were yesterday. Twelve years 
had passed since the Alton visit, and 
here was the same situation. A mass 
of workingmen squandering money, 
health, and intelligence upon alcohol 
in its worst forms, not because they 
preferred it to better things, but be¬ 
cause no wholesome, attractive, sub- 



Laborers in Heat and in Heavy Industries 


177 


stitute was accessible. For that con¬ 
stituency, in those surroundings, amid 
that deadly heat and poisoned dust, 
ice water or Artesian water was un¬ 
thinkable. 

For me, the experience was, indeed, 
a melancholy one. My father, for 
nearly thirty consecutive years a mem¬ 
ber of Congress from Philadelphia, 
taught the doctrine of the American 
workingmen building up the industrial 
strength of the Republic, their own 
prosperity and high wages assured by 
a protective tariff encouraging the in¬ 
dustry of which they were an integral 
part. And here, in his own state of 
Pennsylvania, less than twenty years 
after his death, was this vast typical 
works, producing on an enormous 
scale, under a high tariff, an article 
which had become a necessity of Amer¬ 
ican life. 

Immigrants Replace American-born 

And where was the American work¬ 
ingman? From the Scotch general 
manager to the youngest messenger 
boy not one could be found of native 
birth. None could be induced to work 
amid such torturing surroundings or to 
live according to the standard that the 
manager himself had sketched as the 
prevailing one. 

The immigrants who, in 1907, re¬ 
placed the Americans of my father’s 
nineteenth-century vision, in the great 
basic metal industries demanding heat 
and hard labor, were as powerless to 
defend themselves from their de¬ 
moralizing surroundings as the little 
boys in the Alton glassworks a dozen 
years before. Without command of 
English, separated by their polyglot 
state, exhausted by their daily swelter¬ 
ing labor, and dulled in mind by 
drink, they took what the “groggeries” 
(as the Scotch manager called them) 
offered, to slake the thirst that was as 
clearly a product of the industry which 


employed them as the goods that it 
placed upon the market. From the 
cradle they had been used to beer, of 
which the content and quality had 
been supervised, if not prescribed, by 
their governments. 

It may be argued that great changes 
for the better have been made in the 
industries themselves, since the episode 
of 1895 in Alton and in Pittsburgh in 
1907. Let anyone who inclines to this 
belief read the recent description of 
personal experience in copper smelting, 
in the Atlantic Monthly , for June, 1923, 
under the title “Copper: A Study in 
Ingots and Men,” by Charles Rumford 
Walker. 

The Need Still the Same 

Granted that, in the glass bottle in¬ 
dustry, which has spread in many 
directions, the proportion of dimin¬ 
utive boys has been reduced in some 
states by child labor laws, which have 
stimulated the use of mechanical de¬ 
vices; and granted, also, that gas and 
oil have largely deprived the industry 
of excuse for a permanent night shift 
which was once afforded by the use of 
continuous coal fires throughout the 
works, employees in the glass industry 
still need satisfying substitutes for 
intoxicating beverages. 

In the steel works, at the time of the 
Survey, the twelve-hour day and the 
seven-day week prevailed, as the 
former still does in the plants of the 
United States Steel Corporation. We 
found young “water boys” working 
twelve hours every day (or night) in 
the month; and twenty-four hours on 
two Sundays when the shift changed 
from night to day, or back again from 
day to night, once every fortnight. 
These boys were free, of course, to 
drink at will the water that they pur¬ 
veyed. But, like the men, they found 
little comfort in cold water and were 
steady customers of the “grogshops”’ 


13 


178 


The Annals of the American Academy 


at the gates of the steel plants. Ter¬ 
rible heat, inhumanly long hours and 
night work gave controlling power to 
the craving for stimulants. In the 
employ of the United States Steel 
Corporation water boys will still 
doubtless be found under substan¬ 
tially these conditions, so long as the 
twelve-hour day is continued. 

Safe Drinks Not Trash 

What, in conclusion, are safe drinks 
for employees who suffer from heat 
while at work? Certainly not ice 
water or that drawn freshly from 
Artesian wells. For many people, 
pure water alone is distasteful and 
often injurious. “The safe, old stand- 
by” in glass, iron and steel works is 
water containing oatmeal. Anything 
less attractive would be hard to find! 
Switzerland affords a practical example. 
When some of the railroads were na¬ 
tionalized by the Swiss Federation, 
men employed in the train service were 
forbidden to use alcohol in any form 
during their working day. Fruit 
juice, excellent in quality (not any 
synthetic substitute), is carried on 
trains and is accessible to employees, 
though passengers must content them¬ 
selves with commercial beverages 
bought at stations. 

Chemistry has wrought miracles 
since these observations were made in 
1894-5, 1907, 1913 and 1919 (the latter 
in Switzerland), but what has chemistry 
contributed to the experience of men 
who complain that they “sweat the 
flesh off their bones” in heavy in¬ 
dustries at high temperatures? Near 
beer, coca-cola, and other worthless 
synthetic trash in all known colors 


and of myriad flavors, at commercial 
prices, permanent sources of exaspera¬ 
tion to these laborers. 

Men powerful in body and sluggish 
in mind, of the type who even in 
eight hours exhaust their energy by 
sustained physical exertion at a high 
temperature, will drink whatever mo¬ 
mentarily lessens their discomfort at 
the end of the work period. Good or 
bad, legal or illegal, cheap or dear, 
openly or secretly, drink they will have 
outside if they are not, as a routine 
matter, abundantly supplied with satis¬ 
fying fluid to replace what they have 
spent at their work. This is obviously 
inevitable. The only question is: 
where and what they will drink. 

Forbidding them beer, without 
affording an available substitute 
wherever they suffer from heat and 
heavy work, is merely tempting them 
to violate the Amendment. It is 
living in a fool’s paradise to suppose 
that they will not violate it. They 
will also hate it. They will believe 
that they have been deprived, against 
their will, of beer which they have 
found refreshing and have been taught 
to regard as a food, and furnished in¬ 
stead with worthless stuff which they 
dislike. Their experience will, more¬ 
over, be incessantly so interpreted to 
them by the advocates of light wines 
and beer, within and without the ranks 
of organized labor. 

In the interest of the Amendment, 
therefore, it behooves its friends to 
provide cheap, good, refreshing, non¬ 
alcoholic drinks within permanent 
easy reach of the people who most 
need them. Ordinary commerce has 
failed utterly. 


The Practice of Pharmacy Under the Volstead Act 

By Ambrose Hunsberger, Ph.M. 


F OR the purpose of impressing a 
more precise picture upon the 
minds of those who may have given no 
special thought to the vexing prohibi¬ 
tion problems which confront practic¬ 
ing pharmacists, it seems proper to ask 
indulgence for the presentation of a 
brief resume of the gradual develop¬ 
ment of the practice of pharmacy 
previous to the adoption of the Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment, and also to give 
brief consideration to some of the chief 
factors involved in pharmaceutical 
procedure. 

What Is Pharmacy? 

Pharmacy is defined by Remington 
as being the science which treats of 
medicinal substances. It comprehends 
not only a knowledge of the arts of pre¬ 
paring and dispensing medicines, but it 
also provides methods for their iden¬ 
tification, selection, combination and 
analysis. It further provides facilities 
for research leading to the discovery of 
new remedies, as well as to the applica¬ 
tion of old remedies to new uses. It 
fosters and builds up the collateral 
branches of science, which constitute a 
part of its organism and contributes 
much, through the unselfish labor of its 
votaries, to the scientific and material 
wealth of the nation. 

Early History 

While the practice of pharmacy has 
been carried on in a more or less me¬ 
thodical manner for two or three cen¬ 
turies in European countries, its sys¬ 
tematic development in this country 
began about one century ago. Pre¬ 
vious to that period the few scattered 


apothecaries, whose apprenticeship had 
been served as assistants under medical 
direction, strove valiantly to improve 
the disorganized system of hawking 
medicinal remedies which prevailed 
throughout our thinly populated coun¬ 
try. There was no method of protect¬ 
ing the public from fraud through 
control or regulation of the sale of adul¬ 
terated and harmful medicinal prod¬ 
ucts, and the credulous citizenry of the 
young nation was beguiled by every 
description of fakir and charlatan into 
buying their fantastic panaceas. 

As the nation grew in population and 
wealth, it became increasingly apparent 
that a concerted effort must be made to 
establish some system of control and 
supervision over the sale of medicinal 
substances, in order that the physical 
welfare of the communities might be 
better safeguarded. A further need 
was felt for the laying of a foundation 
upon which might be built a scheme of 
systematic study of pharmacy and the 
collateral branches. 

The First College of Pharmacy 

Acting upon this conviction a meet¬ 
ing of apothecaries was held in Carpen¬ 
ters’ Hall early in the year 1821. The 
deliberation of this earnest body of 
young men, who were fired with zeal 
for scientific and humanitarian achieve¬ 
ment, culminated in the organization 
of the Philadelphia College of Phar¬ 
macy, where a regular system of lectures 
in the different branches was inaug¬ 
urated in November, 1821. 

This laudable movement, which was 
so ably launched, marked the first step 
forward in the development of a system 
of pharmaceutical practice in the 
United States. The movement gained 


179 


180 


The Annals of the American Academy 


great impetus during the intervening 
years through the continuous effort, 
unselfishly contributed by those pio¬ 
neers and their successors, toward the 
expansion and improvement of the prac¬ 
tice of pharmacy as a separate entity. 

The Code of Ethics 

A code of ethics governing the con¬ 
duct of pharmacists who subscribed to 
it was adopted in 1848. The principles 
contained in the code convey the im¬ 
pression of having been drawn by men 
of high moral purpose and marked in¬ 
tellectual attainment. The introduc¬ 
tory paragraph states that 

Pharmacy being a profession which de¬ 
mands knowledge, skill and integrity on 
the part of those engaged in it, and being 
associated with the medical profession in 
the responsible duty of preserving the 
public health, and dispensing the useful 
though often dangerous agents adapted to 
the cure of disease, its members should be 
united on some general principles to be 
observed in their several relations to each 
other, to the medical profession and to the 
public. 

The principles required adherence to 
a certain standard of scientific attain¬ 
ment and professional conduct, limited 
the scope of activity, discountenanced 
secret and quackish methods, encour¬ 
aged the interchange of scientific knowl¬ 
edge, denounced the use of any except 
the purest in drugs, recommended dis¬ 
continuance of the sale of poisonous 
drugs except on physicians’ prescrip¬ 
tions, and held, where there w as reason 
to believe that a purchaser was using 
stimulants or opiates to excess, it w r as 
the duty of the conscientious phar¬ 
macist to discourage the practice by 
refusing to make the sale. 

Professor Procter, a pharmaceutical 
leader in his day, in the crusade against 
those elements of evil that w 7 ere de¬ 
bauching the professions of pharmacy 
and medicine of that period said, 


When we look abroad in the land and 
witness the working of the complex sys¬ 
tems of quackery which, like the miasma of 
an infected region, hovers over every city 
and penetrates every village, leading thou¬ 
sands astray by hollow promises and lying 
certificates of cure, whilst legitimate means 
are neglected, or overlooked, we cannot 
but desire that the strong arm of the law 
might reach forth and banish them from 
among us. 

Organization 

Coincident with the expansion of the 
scheme of systematic pharmaceutical 
education w 7 as the formation of local, 
state and national pharmaceutical 
organizations, the members of which 
freely gave of their time and substance 
in the interest of the advancement of 
their calling. Delegates from the dif¬ 
ferent sections of the country met in 
conference annually, discussed their 
problems and sought for a solution. 
The national organizations which took 
a prominent part in the developmental 
plan w 7 ere the American Pharmaceu¬ 
tical Association, The National Asso¬ 
ciation of Retail Druggists and The 
National Wholesale Druggists Asso¬ 
ciation. 

Legislation 

With the steady increase in the 
native population, augmented by the 
influx of many immigrants from for¬ 
eign lands, the problem of adequately 
regulating the practice of pharmacy 
became more complex and the respon¬ 
sibility greater. 

Being convinced of the obligation of 
the state to safeguard the lives and 
health of its citizens and confident 
that statutory enactment would accom¬ 
plish the reforms that “resolving” 
had failed to bring about, it w r as de¬ 
cided by the organized pharmaceu¬ 
tical bodies to invoke “the strong arm 
of the law” as suggested by Procter. 

Bills w 7 ere drawn which provided for 
official examining boards having power 


The Practice of Pharmacy Under the Volstead Act 


181 


to grant certificates to practice to 
successful candidates having proper 
preliminary qualifications. Gradua¬ 
tion from a college of pharmacy of 
good standing was made a prerequi¬ 
site in most states. A pedagogic 
standard for colleges was established. 
Restrictions governing the sale of 
poisonous, adulterated and vicious 
drugs were included and penalties for 
violation of any of the provisions were 
attached. All of these measures had 
the full support of the pharmaceu¬ 
tical organizations when presented to 
the different state legislatures for en¬ 
actment. Equal support was given to 
the enactment of the Federal Drug 
Import Law, the Pure Food and Drugs 
Law, the Harrison Narcotic Law and 
all other legislation, state and federal, 
that had for its object the conservation 
of public health and the protection and 
preservation of human rights. 

Advanced Educational Standards 

In proportion to the growth of the 
country the need for greater numbers 
of adequately trained pharmacists in¬ 
creased. This condition was antici¬ 
pated and taken care of by organizing 
other colleges of pharmacy throughout 
the country. The scholastic stand¬ 
ards of the newer institutions as well 
as those established in the earlier days 
kept pace with the educational devel¬ 
opment of the nation. 

Where night lectures several times 
a week had sufficed in the early part of 
the last century, full day periods of 
lecture and laboratory work for three, 
four, or five days a week were substi¬ 
tuted in its latter years. The early 
plan of apprenticeship was discarded 
and replaced by a strict requirement of 
four years’ practical drug store ex¬ 
perience as an applied-training pre¬ 
requisite to graduation. Preliminary 
educational requirements for admission 
to college courses were extended to 


four years of high school study or its 
equivalent. Courses were extended to 
cover the following subjects: theory 
and practice of pharmacy, general and 
pharmaceutical chemistry, botany, 
biology, physiology, physiological 
assaying, mathematics, pharmaceutical 
Latin, bacteriology, hygiene, materia 
medica and general pharmacognosy. 

The progress made in the adoption 
of advanced standards of pharmaceu¬ 
tical education during the last century 
is marked and compares favorably 
with the advances in educational re¬ 
quirements made by any of the older 
professions. 

Scientific Contributions 

During the process of building up a 
system of pharmaceutical practice in 
the United States, and as a result of 
it, a splendid group of men and women 
of marked scientific ability was de¬ 
veloped. These builders have gone 
out in the world and enriched its 
scientific literature by their unselfish 
contributions. They have made pos¬ 
sible the development of large in¬ 
dustrial enterprises and they have 
contributed immeasurably to the com¬ 
fort and safety of the citizens of the 
nation by their diligent research in the 
field of food and drug adulteration; 
and by their unremitting effort to 
provide a systematized and safe 
materia medica they have increased 
the effectiveness of the physicians’ 
armamentarium, thereby simplifying 
to a great extent the task of ameliorat¬ 
ing the ills of suffering humanity. 

The names of Parrish, Procter, 
Maisch, Wilbert, Remington and 
those of many other unselfish pharma¬ 
ceutical workers are writ as high upon 
the walls of the temple of American 
science as are the names of Washing¬ 
ton, Jefferson, Lincoln and Roosevelt 
upon the scroll of American state¬ 
craft. 


182 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Economic Growth 

The economic side of pharmaceu¬ 
tical development in America has kept 
pace, step by step, with its scientific 
evolution. Modest efforts to establish 
pharmaceutical manufacturing plants 
met with success and the small begin¬ 
nings gradually grew into institutions 
of tremendous size, employing thou¬ 
sands of scientific and other assistants 
and involving investments of capital 
which aggregate many millions of 
dollars. 

The manufacture of pharmaceutical 
and heavy chemicals likewise begun 
in a small way has grown to gigantic 
proportions and represents enormous 
investments of capital in buildings and 
equipment, providing employment for 
other thousands of workers, scientific 
and technical. 

Directly related to the economic 
side of pharmacy are other large, well- 
organized plants which manufacture 
surgical supplies, chemical specialties, 
vaccines and antitoxins, glandular 
products, essential oils, etc. The prod¬ 
ucts which are annually sent out in 
enormous volume from these various 
plants go into every part of the civi¬ 
lized world and they carry with them 
the message of American progressive¬ 
ness and scientific efficiency. 

Wholesale distributors of drug prod¬ 
ucts represent another important link 
in the economic chain. They have 
multiplied from a scattered few, who 
carried on a small business in imported 
and native crude drugs a hundred years 
ago, into hundreds of large, competently 
managed enterprises, whose annual 
turnover in drug-store commodities 
represents investments of hundreds of 
millions of dollars and provides em¬ 
ployment for thousands of people. 

The discussion of these factors of 
production and supply of pharmaceu¬ 
tical essentials necessarily comes under 


the head of economic development. 
There is, however, no intention of 
conveying the impression that they 
limit the efficiency of their products by 
any rule of dollars and cents. On the 
contrary, those who have achieved the 
greatest measure of prestige and suc¬ 
cess have done so through strict ad¬ 
herence to a well-defined policy of 
scientific laboratory control of their 
processes. The outstanding concerns 
maintain independent laboratories 
thoroughly equipped and well manned 
for continuous research purposes. 
While a portion of the work which is 
carried on by their investigators is 
directed toward maintaining the qual¬ 
ity of their own products, that part of 
it which is of general scientific interest 
is published in scientific and technical 
journals as a voluntary contribution 
to the sum total of human knowledge. 

The Pharmacist on the Corner 

The radical change in pharmaceu¬ 
tical practice which the passing of a 
century has wrought is perhaps most 
strikingly evident in the retail field. 
The evolution of the latter-day phar¬ 
macist, from his prototype in the per¬ 
son of the humble dealer in crude drugs 
performing his circumscribed task of 
assisting the doctor of his day,* to the 
present-day graduate with his high 
school education, four years’ pharma¬ 
ceutical experience, a pharmacy college 
diploma in one hand and in the other 
a certificate from his state pronouncing 
him qualified to practice, represents an 
advance, indeed. In proportion to the 
increase in his cultural attainments, 
the position of the pharmacist as a 
community factor became more im¬ 
portant and his responsibility greater. 
The service he was able to render is 
essential to community life and com¬ 
fort, and the different states in recog¬ 
nition of this, and the further fact that 
he has properly qualified himself, give 


The Practice of Pharmacy Under the Volstead Act 


183 


legal sanction by granting a certifi¬ 
cate which entitles him to perforin cer¬ 
tain services and denies the same priv¬ 
ilege to others who have not qualified 
similarly. 

By virtue of the character of service 
which may be rendered by him, the 
pharmacist is brought into more fre¬ 
quent and intimate contact with the 
domestic affairs of a community than 
is any other single element in the social 
structure. Be the problem in question 
one concerning health, hygiene, church, 
politics, morals, ethics, finance, or 
w r hat not, the assumption is a fair one 
that at one stage or another in its 
solution you may find that the pharma¬ 
cist is consulted. 

The major obligation of the phar¬ 
macist lies in the domain of health con¬ 
servation and restoration. In this he 
is an important if not an altogether in¬ 
dispensable factor as an adjunct to the 
intelligent treatment of disease. A 
full and complete discharge of this 
obligation is a professional duty per¬ 
formed in behalf of community welfare. 
The state anticipates that the obliga¬ 
tion w ill be met as a quid pro quo for the 
exclusive privilege to practice which it 
grants to the pharmacist. 

Duties 

The duties involved in fulfilling his 
obligation are exacting and the respon¬ 
sibilities grave. There is no middle 
course along which to steer. Com¬ 
plying with all the requirements con¬ 
cerning licensure, registration, permits, 
etc., constitutes a primary detail of 
preparation. Then must be provided 
an establishment properly equipped 
with official records and formularies, 
journals, apparatus, stock, and com¬ 
petently manned. 

Supplies must be provided in suffi¬ 
cient variety to meet without delay 
emergency calls for any one of many 
thousands of medicinal substances, sur¬ 


gical aids or hygienic devices. Proper 
storage facilities must be available 
for the protection of articles susceptible 
of deterioration through exposure or 
age. Care must be exercised in the 
purchase and manufacture of prepara¬ 
tions in order that the official standard 
of quality may be maintained. An 
alert and ready force of competent 
assistants to meet any demands upon 
these resources must be on duty during 
many hours of each day. 

Constant vigilance in the field of 
research must be exercised in order that 
new remedies may be made promptly 
available to the sick and suffering. 

Responsibilities 

The responsibilities with which the 
pharmacist is charged place him in a 
somewhat unique position, since there 
is perhaps no other class of citizens 
given equal custodianship over the acts 
of their fellow citizens. 

The pharmacist quite naturally is 
responsible for bis own errors and those 
of his assistants, as well as for the 
quality of drugs which he dispenses. 
He is further charged with responsi¬ 
bility for errors made by prescribes in 
ordering overdoses of dangerous drugs 
in prescriptions, and for the control of 
drugs which are habit forming; also for 
the sufficient medication of prescrip¬ 
tions containing alcohol and for restric¬ 
tion of the distribution of alcohol and 
liquors, for the genuineness of the form 
upon which liquor is prescribed, as 
well as for the good intent of the pre¬ 
server of liquor or narcotic drugs. 
Finally, he must satisfy himself that 
such alcoholic or narcotic preparations 
as he may dispense according to law 
will not be applied to a wrong purpose 
by the purchaser. 

With several exceptions, which are 
discussed later, these responsibilities 
have been assumed cheerfully because 
pharmacists as a class are primarily 


184 


The Annals of the American Academy 


good citizens without inclination to 
shirk any duty which, if faithfully per¬ 
formed, promises a constructive result 
for the general benefit of organized 
society. 

Pharmacy a National Asset 

It has been the purpose of the fore¬ 
going sketchy pharmaceutical resume 
to present to the lay mind a reasonably 
adequate conception of the important 
part pharmacy has taken in the up¬ 
building of the nation, and to implant 
another thought concerning its im¬ 
portance as a national asset today. 
While the study of statistics might re¬ 
veal the millions of dollars invested in 
the numerous pharmaceutical enter¬ 
prises and thus establish an economic 
value, there are, however, also the 
elements of scientific achievement, and 
professional service to be reckoned in. 
If, therefore, all of the contributing 
factors are considered without preju¬ 
dice, there can be no question concern¬ 
ing the right of pharmacy to its place 
among the indispensable assets of the 
country. 

II 

The Prohibition Amendment 

At the time of adoption of the pro¬ 
hibition amendment, this gigantic and 
intricate pharmaceutical machine, with 
its thousands of wheels within wheels 
and its myriads of operators, was func¬ 
tioning perfectly, with the exception of 
certain unimportant parts which had 
developed a slight war imbalance. The 
immediate interest which manifested 
itself in relation to the adoption of the 
prohibition amendment concerned the 
question of alcohol. The satisfactory 
adjustment of this question was con¬ 
sidered by pharmacists to be vital be¬ 
cause alcohol, as such, or in combina¬ 
tion, enters into pharmaceutical opera¬ 
tions more frequently than any other 
single drug, and there is no known sub¬ 


stitute for it that can be used for 
medicinal preparations. 

Any feeling of alarm that existed in 
this connection was dispelled, however, 
when the language of the amendment 
was published and it was found that it 
referred entirely to the distribution of 
liquor for beverage purposes. 

Section 1 of the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment to the Constitution reads as 
follows: 

After one year from the ratification of 
this Article the manufacture, sale, or 
transportation of intoxicating liquors 
within, the importation thereof into, or the 
exportation thereof from the United States 
and all territories subject to the jurisdiction 
thereof, for beverage purposes is hereby 
prohibited. 

The language employed in this 
section, it will be noted, is plain, un¬ 
equivocal, and states specifically the 
intent of the amendment: namely, 
that the “manufacture, sale . 
of intoxicating liquors for beverage pur¬ 
poses is hereby prohibited.” 

The national prohibition act which 
provides for the enforcement of the 
prohibition amendment has its pur¬ 
pose stated in its long title and in the 
following language: 

An act to prohibit intoxicating bever¬ 
ages, and to regulate the manufacture, 
production, use, and sale of high-proof 
spirits for other than beverage purposes, 
and to insure an ample supply of alcohol 
and promote its use in scientific research 
and in the development of fuel, dye and 
other lawful industries. 

The absence of ambiguity in the 
language used in the long title of the 
Enforcement Act is quite as marked as 
it is in the amendment itself. The 
title of the Act states with the utmost 
clarity its purpose. “To 'prohibit 
intoxicating beverages ... to in¬ 
sure an ample supply of alcohol and 
promote its use in scientific research 


The Practice of Pharmacy Under the Volstead Act 


185 


and in the development of fuel, dye and 
other lawful industries 

Pharmacists Efforts to Help 

In the belief that the Enforcement 
Act meant just what its language im¬ 
plied, its passage through the Houses 
of Congress was accepted with equa¬ 
nimity, with the exception of the pro¬ 
vision which designated pharma¬ 
cists as the legal distributors of liquor, 
as such, for medicinal purposes. In 
the fear, since realized, that this dis¬ 
position of the liquor problem would 
exercise a demoralizing influence upon 
the practice of pharmacy, that part of 
the Act which legalized it was generally 
opposed by pharmaceutical organiza¬ 
tions. Despite this opposition the 
provision was written into the law and 
pharmacists found themselves the 
legal, sole, and more or less unwilling 
custodians of intoxicating liquor, dis¬ 
tribution of which v^as subject to the 
regulations under the Act, which were 
subsequently promulgated with the 
approval of the Secretary of the 
Treasury. 

Having failed to divert the distri¬ 
bution of liquor to some other lawful 
channel, it was hoped that some plan 
could be worked out whereby a limited 
number of distributing points might be 
established, sufficient in number to 
give adequate service to the sick and 
also to permit those who desired to 
avail themselves of the distribution 
privilege, under the law, to do so. Be¬ 
cause of the small percentage of phar¬ 
macists who had indicated any in¬ 
clination to become distributors, this 
plan seemed to promise success, but it 
was upset by the public statement of 
an ambitious revenue official, made 
soon after the prohibition enactment, 
to the effect that a large majority of 
pharmacists had qualified as distrib¬ 
utors by taking out “retail liquor deal¬ 
ers” licenses. This statement stam¬ 


peded a noticeable number into like 
action with the thought of protecting 
their business interests from this new 
competition. 

An interesting fact in this connection 
is that a meeting held two days previ¬ 
ous to the date of the above statement 
and attended by some two hundred 
representative pharmacists revealed 
that but fourteen out of this num¬ 
ber had qualified as “retail liquor 
dealers.” 

It should be stated in explanation 
of the paradoxical term used above 
that, in addition to securing a permit 
and filing an adequate bond under the 
prohibition law, a pharmacist, in order 
to qualify as a dispenser of liquor or 
pure grain alcohol, as such, is required 
to procure from the Collector of In¬ 
ternal Revenue a Retail Liquor Deal¬ 
ers’ license and pay an annual tax of 
twenty-five dollars. 

A second effort to keep the number 
of liquor-distributing points within 
reasonable bounds, which was ad¬ 
vocated by pharmacists, proposed 
that permits to dispense intoxicating 
liquors, as such, be withheld during the 
first year’s business of a newly estab¬ 
lished concern. It was felt that this 
plan would discourage those who might 
be disposed to enter the practice of 
pharmacy for the sole purpose of 
capitalizing and abusing the liquor 
privilege, and that it would in no way 
interfere with the right of any qualified 
person to open a new establishment 
and render full pharmaceutical service 
to the community from the beginning. 
The plan was submitted to the Fed¬ 
eral Prohibition Office, which gave it 
lengthy consideration and eventually 
decided that there was nothing in the 
Enforcement Act that permitted 
discrimination between applicants for 
permits to distribute liquors and, 
since its agents were bound by 
the limitations of the law, permits 


186 


The Annals of the American Academy 


must be granted to all qualified appli¬ 
cants. 

The H and I Permits 

A third attempt to control the situa¬ 
tion also met with discouragement, and 
in this connection a w r ord of explana¬ 
tion concerning the effectiveness of the 
several types of permits is necessary. 
While the regulations under the Act 
provide for various classes of permits 
each having its own special significance, 
designated by a letter, only two of them 
relate to this discussion, namely, those 
which are identified by the letters II 
and I. One or the other of these two 
permits must be secured in order to 
carry on the practice of pharmacy un¬ 
der the prohibition act. 

The possessor of an H permit is en¬ 
titled to withdraw alcohol, whisky, 
brandy, gin, rum and wines for use in 
compounding pharmaceutical prepara¬ 
tions and prescriptions, all of which, 
when ready for sale, must be sufficiently 
medicated to preclude their use for 
beverage purposes. 

The possessor of an I permit is en¬ 
titled to the same privileges, plus the 
right to sell any of the above-mentioned 
substances as such, without rendering 
them unfit for beverage purposes, but 
only on prescriptions written by phy¬ 
sicians qualified under the Act, and for 
medicinal purposes only. 

In other words, the II permit was 
designed to provide a lawful method of 
procuring and using these pharmaceu¬ 
tical essentials in order that phar¬ 
macists might continue to function ef¬ 
fectively along previously established 
lines. The I permit differs only in that 
it adds the further privilege of dispens¬ 
ing unmedicated intoxicating liquors 
for medicinal purposes to holders of 
properly executed orders issued by 
qualified physicians. 

Having in mind the frailty of human 
nature and believing that prevention is 


better than cure, the third move by 
pharmacists to limit the number of 
liquor-distributing points involved an 
effort to encourage a general applica¬ 
tion for H permits. It was assumed, 
no doubt safely, that a sufficiently 
large number to meet legitimate de¬ 
mands for medicinal liquors would 
apply for I permits. 

This plan also fell flat, for the reason 
that minor officials in the prohibition 
department suddenly developed an 
obsession for placing their personal in¬ 
terpretations upon the meaning of pro¬ 
hibition regulations. Their interpreta¬ 
tions were by no means uniform, and 
this lack of team work in their mental 
processes brought about a state of con¬ 
siderable confusion. Some officials at¬ 
tributed full effectiveness to II permits, 
others limited them to the withdrawal 
of alcohol only, and those functioning 
in one sovereign state during one year 
required all retail pharmacists who de¬ 
sired to carry on practice to take out I 
permits, automatically creating, willy 
nilly, a hundred per cent quota of 
potential distributors of liquor in that 
state. 

Under these involved conditions 
there was only one alternative in sight 
for those who desired to avoid any in¬ 
terruption in their legitimate practice, 
and that consisted in accepting an I 
permit. Service to the sick is impera¬ 
tive and cannot be delayed pending the 
outcome of experimental procedure, and 
for this reason the alternative in the 
case in the shape of I permits was gen¬ 
erally accepted. 

It should be understood that a phar¬ 
macist operating under an I permit is a 
free agent so far as the distribution of 
liquor is concerned. He may qualify 
as a distributor by paying an annual 
tax of twenty-five dollars and securing 
the necessary license, or he may refuse 
to become a distributor and simply 
operate as under the H permit. Under 


The Practice of Pharmacy Under the Volstead Act 


187 


the latter permit he is not entitled to 
qualify as a retail liquor dealer. 

Forcing I Permits Created 
Liquor Outlets 

Contemplating this situation from the 
standpoint of strict prohibition enforce¬ 
ment, and that is the only standpoint 
tenable for the law-abiding American 
citizen, it would appear in the above 
connection that a clearer interpretation 
of the regulations would have had 
the effect of reducing the number 
of liquor distributors, actual and po¬ 
tential, materially. While it does not 
follow that every I permittee will 
necessarily become a distributor of 
liquor, there can be no controversy con¬ 
cerning the inability of the H permittee 
to qualify as such under his permit. 
The greater the number, therefore, 
operating under the H permit, the 
less the temptation. As the tempta¬ 
tion is removed, the dangers of abuse 
diminish and the task of effective 
prohibition enforcement becomes more 
simplified. 

While it is understood that there 
is no authority for limiting a qual¬ 
ified applicant to one or the other 
permit, it does seem unfortunate that 
those who essayed to establish such 
an interpretation of the regulations 
failed to grasp the principle laid down 
in Section 3, Title 2, of the Act as 
follows: 

All provisions of this Act shall be liber¬ 
ally construed to the end that the use of 
intoxicating liquors as a beverage may be 
prevented. 

It may, or may not, be a significant 
fact that the state referred to above, 
in which for a time all pharmacists were 
required to accept I permits, acquired 
some six hundred new so-called drug 
stores during a period in which 10 per 
cent of that number would have repre¬ 
sented a normal increase. 


“Mushroom” Enterprises 

A convenient loophole through 
which undesirable persons may wriggle 
their way and secure at least a foothold 
upon the pharmaceutical ladder is 
provided in most states through lack 
of a law restricting drug store owner¬ 
ship to qualified pharmacists. Prac¬ 
tically all of the states permit any 
person to own a drug store who has the 
ambition, and the price to acquire it. 
If lacking in the necessary legal quali¬ 
fications to conduct it as such, some 
one who is qualified can usually be 
found who is willing to be influenced, 
for a price, to conduct it according to 
the predilections of the owner. 

LTnceasing effort has been put forth 
by pharmaceutical agencies since the 
advent of prohibition to discourage 
admission to the practice of those 
who profess honorable motives, but 
whose mercenary impulses are but 
poorly cloaked by the mantle of 
pharmacy which they audaciously 
assume. 

The tendency of pseudo-pharma¬ 
ceutical ventures to multiply, which 
was engendered by prohibition and 
does not appear to be controllable 
under its enforcement, is reflected in 
both retail and wholesale practice. In 
the hope of controlling liquor distri¬ 
bution in the wholesale drug field, a 
ruling was promulgated by the pro¬ 
hibition office which restricted sales of 
liquor at wholesale of 10 per cent of the 
total volume of business. This plan 
at first glance appeared to provide the 
desired control and was readily agreed 
to by the long established wholesale 
drug houses. As a deterrent to new 
enterprises, however, it failed, because 
it did not inspire the slightest feeling 
of dismay in the breasts of ambitious 
newcomers, and the increase in num¬ 
ber of self-styled wholesale drug con¬ 
cerns throughout the country is as 



188 


The Annals of the American Academy 


amazing as it is unwarranted by the 
economic needs. 

The ruling concerning the ratio of 
liquor sales to drug sales in a way 
assumed the form of a boomerang 
against the old line houses. The latter 
have built upon a foundation of serv¬ 
ice, quality, prestige, and they follow 
the recognized rules of legitimate 
merchandising in their business prac¬ 
tice. Many of the new enterprises are 
conducted along lines which ignore all 
economic law and violate every rule 
of intelligent merchandising, in their 
efforts to secure a worth-while volume 
of general sales upon which to build a 
business in liquor. 

The alluring prospect of fantastic 
profits upon sales of the latter more 
than compensate them for the price 
sacrifices made upon other commodi¬ 
ties for the purpose of encouraging an 
outlet for established lines of merchan¬ 
dise. The existence of many of these 
“mushroom” enterprises both in the 
wholesale and retail drug field is often 
ephemera], but the injury inflicted up¬ 
on the calling which they prostituted 
lives long after them and serves as an 
uncomfortable thorn in the side of the 
legitimate practitioner. 

Enforcement by Regulation 

One who has closely observed the 
administration of the prohibition en¬ 
forcement law until recently has 
difficulty in avoiding the conclusion 
that some of the thought and energy 
which has been directed toward regu¬ 
lating the authorized dealer in alcohol, 
liquors and wines who respects the law 
might have been more profitably 
utilized in apprehending and prosecut¬ 
ing the unauthorized dealers, who look 
upon the law as being a joke and its 
administration a farce. 

To be sure, it is necessary to estab¬ 
lish a system of control of the substances 
proscribed under the prohibition act in 


order that proper supervision may be 
maintained over production, with¬ 
drawal, use and distribution. That 
obvious requirement, however, would 
seem to be susceptible of being handled 
in a business-like way, devoid of in¬ 
tricate and contradictory rules and reg¬ 
ulations, and in a manner quite free of 
implied suspicion of the designs and 
deeds of those who involuntarily be¬ 
came the objects of regulation without 
departing from the routine of their 
lawful and essential occupations. 

Admittedly there are those who may 
abuse the legal privileges which are 
theirs under the prohibition act, just as 
they may incur infractions of other 
laws; but, may not one have confidence 
in the effectiveness of the laws them¬ 
selves to provide punishment of the 
culprits as is contemplated under the 
American system of jurisprudence? 
Why, then, make particeps criminis of 
fifty thousand pharmacists and penal¬ 
ize them with restrictive regulations, 
when but a small percentage of this 
number—probably “the lower five” 
—falls from grace. It will not make 
the other forty-nine thousand odd feel 
any the more kindly toward prohibition 
enforcement, nor will it deter for a 
moment the mind imbued with crim¬ 
inal intent. 

Provisions in Law not Utilized 

As an illustration of the lost motion 
resulting from the application of the 
system of law enforcement by regula¬ 
tion, the experience with Essence 
Jamaica Ginger may be cited. It was 
charged that large quantities of this 
century-old household remedy were 
being sold by certain unscrupulous per¬ 
sons to others equally unscrupulous, os¬ 
tensibly for use for beverage purposes. 
The Act provides that “any person who 
shall knowingly sell any of the articles 
mentioned in paragraph b for use for 
beverage purposes (which includes 


The Practice of Pharmacy Under the Volstead Act 


189 


Essence Jamaica Ginger) shall be sub¬ 
ject to the penalties provided in Section 
29 of this title.” (Section 4, Title 2.) 

Whether this apparently adequate 
provision in the law was considered 
ineffective, or too troublesome to apply 
to the sporadic violators is not evident, 
but the idea of controlling similar in¬ 
fractions at one stroke was evolved in 
the prohibition office and made effec¬ 
tive by the declaration that Essence 
Jamaica Ginger was “fit for beverage 
purposes,” and as such it automatically 
fell under the ban of sale along with 
whisky, brandy, etc. 

Instead, therefore, of utilizing the 
provisions in the law to punish the com¬ 
paratively small number of offenders 
whose greed ran away with their better 
judgment, the remainder of the fifty 
thousand practitioners were penalized 
by peremptory orders to cease forth¬ 
with the sale of this household remedy 
to their hundreds of thousands of inno¬ 
cent patrons, to most of whom the prod¬ 
uct in question had no other signifi¬ 
cance than that of being a valuable 
domestic emergency remedy. 

Annoyance Without Compensating 
Benefits 

Since a pharmacist may himself com¬ 
pound under the prohibition law any of 
the products which he dispenses, it 
becomes difficult to comprehend that 
anyone inclined toward moral strabis¬ 
mus will be moved to obey a regulation 
when he has plainly shown his con¬ 
tempt for the law under which the reg¬ 
ulation is issued. If, therefore, he 
should fail to obey the regulation just 
as he disregarded the law, he must be 
sought out and prosecuted under the 
law and the circle is complete, since 
that brings us to the point from which 
we started,—namely, the provision for 
his prosecution in the law itself. 

If the law after all is the thing, it 
does not seem to be the part of wisdom 


and certainly is not helpful to the cause 
of prohibition to use the latter as an 
instrument by which thousands of 
potentially good citizens are enmeshed 
in a maze of regulatory red tape, re¬ 
striction of action, and which permits 
their harassment with trivial technical¬ 
ities and irksome rules which test their 
patience if not their confidence to the 
utmost degree. It is probably a safe 
guess that many substantial but dis¬ 
gruntled citizens, who have lent their 
support to organizations antagonistic 
to the cause of prohibition, have done 
so in protest against the prevailing 
methods of enforcement rather than in 
opposition to the principle involved. 

Irksome Red Tape 

The network of regulations which 
has been woven about the legitimate 
dealer in spirituous products is as in¬ 
tricate and incomprehensible as it ap¬ 
pears to be ineffective, in so far as pro¬ 
hibiting the illicit traffic in intoxicating 
liquor is concerned. 

A sixty-four page set of regulations 
supplemented a flood of Treasury 
decisions, amended regulations, rul¬ 
ings, pro. mimeographs, pro. circulars, 
etc., followed in turn by an incessant 
stream of qualifying communications 
carrying revisions, interpretations, re¬ 
strictions and cancellations of orders 
which were promulgated without being 
fully digested, all of them subject to 
varied, autocratic, and sometimes 
vicious interpretations by the multi¬ 
tude of agents “clothed with brief 
authority” to enforce the prohibition 
act, has served to keep the pharma¬ 
ceutical mind in a state of feverish 
activity, if not anxiety, for several 
years past. 

Other added activities are involved 
in complying with sundry requirements 
such as filing bonds guaranteeing the 
Government against loss of additional 
tax collectible upon any alcohol or liq- 


190 


The Annals of the American Academy 


uor that might perchance be diverted 
to beverage use; submitting formulas 
of own-make preparations containing 
alcohol; applying for permits; applying 
for withdrawals; making affidavits, 
then more affidavits; segregating into 
designated classes the various prep¬ 
arations manufactured which contain 
alcohol; keeping detailed records of 
alcohol consumed in these operations 
and filing monthly reports of with¬ 
drawals and disposition of alcohol and 
liquors with inventory of stocks on 
hand. 


Detrimental Results 

The necessity for a detailed anal¬ 
ysis of pharmaceutical operations in¬ 
volved in the use of alcohol which is 
required in the monthly reports re¬ 
ferred to has had a most detrimental 
influence upon the continued develop¬ 
ment of pharmaceutical practice. As 
stated before, alcohol enters into 
pharmaceutical operations at every 
turn. In prescription practice it 
must be available immediately for the 
thousand and one purposes to which it 
only is adapted. It enters into the 
compounding of hundreds of official 
preparations that must be kept on 
hand constantly in order that needed 
remedies for the relief of the sick and 
suffering may be furnished promptly. 
To keep only an accurate record of the 
number of times alcohol is used during 
a day in a busy prescription pharmacy 
would in itself be an uncertain task, 
and to attempt in addition to segregate 
its varied uses into classes does not 
promise accurate results. 

Forced by the many other details 
which have been added to their daily 
task to seek relief from some quarter, 
many pharmacists to avoid a certain 
amount of record-keeping buy the 
products which they are equipped to 
make, and others in sheer disgust and 
following the line of least resistance 


have laid aside altogether the 
fessional prerogative and are co. ... 2 
their activities mainly to liquor dis¬ 
tribution, interspersed with intensive 
merchandising along department store 
lines. 


Suggested Elimination of Tedious 
Reports 


Tabulating a monthly report of liq¬ 
uor distribution, compared to keeping 
a record and furnishing a report of 
alcohol used in preparing medicines 
for the sick, is simplicity itself. Liq¬ 
uor may only be dispensed in original 
bottles and the number of bottles or 
hand at the end of the month sub 
tracted from the number on hand at tb 
beginning, and acquired during tl 
month, quickly reveals the numb j 
sold. Inasmuch as the use of alcol f 
in certain quantities by pharmacb 
for preparing medicines is a centui 
old prerogative, it does seem that 
method might be devised under tl \ 
prohibition act for its continued use i \ 
similar quantities for the same purpose \ 
which would reduce the alcohol reports 
of the prescription pharmacist to the 
simple proportions of those rendered 
by the liquor distributor at least. 

A short step in this direction would 
be made by requiring reports at in¬ 
tervals of three months in conformity 
with the present system of figuring 
withdrawals on a quarterly basis. The 
involved detail of segregating the con¬ 
sumption of alcohol into numerous 
classes might also be simplified by re¬ 
ducing the number of classes. The 
object to be attained by the present 
plan of classification is to permit 
balancing the quantity of alcohol 
withdrawn with the purpose to which 
it is applied and thereby prevent 
illicit diversion. It is not conceivable, 
however, that anyone who did divert 
his supplies would state the dereliction 
in his report. Therefore this feature 





The Practice of Pharmacy Under the Volstead Act 


191 


to lose its utility except as a 
to invite technical violations 

, 

161 -witistical use. 

Alcohol More Restricted 
Than Liquor 

There is nothing in the prohibition 
law that indicates any desire to abolish 
the legitimate practice of pharmacy. 
On the contrary, it states specifically 
that alcohol is to be made available in 
ample quantity to encourage lawful 
industry and scientific research. The 
practice of pharmacy being both a 
lawful industry and an instrument for 
scientific research, it would seem a 
vork of supererogation to interfere 
vith the acknowledged need for al- 
»hol, or to hamper its legitimate use 
*th irksome and meticulous rules and 
- pfiations. 

j If the cause of prohibition is safe, 
d it probably is, under the offer of 
' 5 prohibition office to permit with- 
awal of twelve hundred thousand 
aarts of whisky annually by physi¬ 
cians for use in emergencies, waiving 
records and reports, it certainly would 
iot seem to be jeopardized by conced¬ 
ing to pharmacists the obvious right to 
withdraw and use alcohol in pre-prohi¬ 
bition quantities, subject to reasonable 
and workable rules and regulations. 

If the obsession which dominates 
some minds that the successful out¬ 
come of prohibition enforcement is 
premised upon a reduction in with¬ 
drawals of alcohol can be removed, and 
attention concentrated upon the mur¬ 
derous illicit traffic in whisky, the cause 
of prohibition will be advanced and 
the practice of pharmacy saved. 

Valuable Knowledge of 
Pharmacists 

The plea of pharmacy is only for free¬ 
dom to exercise its prerogatives, and in 
defense of its right to live. The con¬ 
sistent attitude of established pharma¬ 


ceutical interests toward prohibition 
enforcement has been one of helpful¬ 
ness. The enormity of the task in¬ 
volved in effectual enforcement ap¬ 
pealed strongly to pharmacists because 
they knew better than any outside of 
the practice the many ramifications of 
the channel through which alcoholic 
medicinal products must pass on their 
way to the legitimate consumer. 

They knew the weak points in the 
plan of distribution and they knew the 
strong points which would be subject 
to attack by those disposed to break 
down the plan. They knew the legit¬ 
imate need for alcohol in the past and 
they knew that the need would con¬ 
tinue to exist. They offered this and 
other information unreservedly, both 
as good citizens and for the purpose of 
safeguarding their lawful occupation 
against demoralization and destruction. 
They have not lost hope in spite of 
their many trials and they still feel 
confident that the principle of prohibi¬ 
tion and the practice of pharmacy can 
both live and flourish under the same 
flag. 

Ways and Means of Enforcement 

To achieve this purpose they believe 

(1) That prohibition enforcement 
should be conducted along lines 
conforming to the dignity and im¬ 
portance of the government which 
launched it. 

(2) That the cooperation of all 
good citizens should be encouraged, 
not antagonized. 

(3) That unwarranted assumption 
of prerogatives by subordinates in 
the, enforcement division should 
peremptorily cease. 

( 4 ) That swashbuckling methods 
of enforcement by agents with dime 
novel soubriquets should be abolished. 

(5) That inquisitorial methods 
have no place in the American system 
of government. 




192 


The Annals of the American Academy 


(6) That the prohibition enact¬ 
ment has not changed the principle 
that a man is considered innocent un¬ 
til proven guilty by due process of 
law. 

( 7 ) That the work of prohibition 
enforcement would be facilitated by 
inclusion in its forces of men of expert 
pharmaceutical training, endorsed by 
their state pharmaceutical associa¬ 
tions. 

(8) In the cooperation of all good 
citizens for the preservation of 
American institutions, and to the 


achievement of this end they pledge 
their best effort. 

In closing this more or less super¬ 
ficial glimpse of American pharmacy 
and its troubles under prohibition, 
reference should be made to the fact 
that the Commissioner of Internal 
Revenue within the year has taken 
cognizance of the plight of those con¬ 
cerned and has suggested an Alcohol 
Advisory Committee representing the 
various pharmaceutical interests whose 
cooperation he invites for the purpose 
of mitigating the present difficulties. 


A National Policy for Enforcement of Prohibition 

By Felix Frankfurter 
Harvard Law School 


P ROHIBITION was written into 
the Constitution with as much 
deliberation as attended the enact¬ 
ment of any amendment to the Con¬ 
stitution. It is sheer caricature to 
convey the impression, as do writers 
like Mr. Fabian Franklin, that the 
Eighteenth Amendment came like a 
thief in the night, and as a result of 
the machinations of the Anti-Saloon 
League. Prohibition was the cul¬ 
mination of fifty years of continuous 
effort; nor did the movement lack 
alert, persistent and powerful opposi¬ 
tion. If the process by which this 
Amendment came into the Constitu¬ 
tion is open to question, one hardly 
dare contemplate the moral justifica¬ 
tion of some of the other amendments, 
or of the Constitution itself. Whether 
we like it or not, the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment is! 

Three Courses of Action 

With that as a starting point, there 
are three courses of action open to us: 
(1) repeal; (2) nullification; (3) en¬ 
forcement. 

(1) Repeal .—I did not favor the 
adoption of the Amendment because 
I felt it was a proper subject for state 
duties, except in so far as federal action 
was necessary to complement, and 
thereby render effective, the enforcing 
powers of states which had adopted 
the prohibition policy. But the 
Eighteenth Amendment made prohi¬ 
bition the law of the nation. A great 
people should not deal with a deliber¬ 
ately adopted social policy like a fickle 
child throwing away a new toy. We 
ought to give the experiment a fair 
trial, for a reasonable length of time. 


If then the demonstrated evil out¬ 
weighs the good and falsifies the ex¬ 
pectations upon which it was based, 
it will be time deliberately to reverse 
the policy by the same process of 
amendment by which it was passed. 

(2) Nullification .—But the oppo¬ 
nents of the Eighteenth Amendment 
recognize that the sentiment of the 
country at large makes all talk of re¬ 
peal, at present, futile. So, a diversi¬ 
fied school of vehement feeling, with 
its gamut running from Dr. Nicholas 
Murray Butler to the N. Y. World , 
suggests in effect, if not in words (with 
a rare, academic reference by President 
Butler to law-enforcement), that the 
Amendment be disregarded, just as the 
Reconstruction Amendments have 
been disregarded in the case of the 
negro. How many provisions of the 
Constitution can be flouted with im¬ 
punity, without undue stress and 
strain on popular confidence in the 
Constitution, upon which the present 
social structure finally rests? There 
are millions of Americans who do not 
feel that the opportunity to drink 
intoxicating liquors is one of the im¬ 
mutable Rights of Man. Their con¬ 
viction made possible the Eighteenth 
Amendment. 

It is dangerous to identify one’s 
personal preference with the limits of 
liberty or the sovereignty of conscience. 
If some—particularly the rich and 
educated and powerful—give effect to 
the feeling that prohibition is an in¬ 
vasion of their “personal rights,” 
others will give effect to the feeling 
that other laws are an infringement of 
their “rights.” I know that some 
opponents of the Eighteenth Amend- 

193 


14 



194 


The Annals of the American Academy 


ment, like the N. Y. World , are also 
vigorous opponents of the Fascist 
philosophy of the law of force. But a 
policy, in effect, of systematic nullifica¬ 
tion of law on the part of some, as to 
interests that affect them, is bound to 
produce an increasing disregard for law 
by masses of men, in other matters 
touching their special interests. Se¬ 
lective law-obedience makes for an 
atmosphere in which we cannot pos¬ 
sibly hope to solve our pressing prob¬ 
lems. 

(3) Enforcement .—The only way 
out, then, is honest and effective en¬ 
forcement. And the real problem, I 
believe, is the effective method of en¬ 
forcing the Eighteenth Amendment in 
view of the federal character of our 
nation. Here, as elsewhere, the solu¬ 
tion must be looked for in the proper 
distribution of duties between the 
states and the federal Government. 
Double enforcement of prohibition by 
states and nation is unfair and waste¬ 
ful. Centralized nation-wide enforce¬ 
ment is impossible of achievement. 
It will either break or corrupt the 
federal machinery that attempts it, or 
do both. The answer is to be found 
in the respective capacities and inter¬ 
ests of states and nation. The Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment itself furnishes the 
clue to the only effective mode for its 
enforcement. 

Federal and State Jurisdiction 

By that Amendment prohibition be¬ 
came the law of the land. The Vol¬ 
stead Act prescribed for the nation 
what liquor should be deemed in¬ 
toxicating. But the people, when 
adopting the Amendment, recognized 
fully that the law could not be en¬ 
forced without the cooperation of the 
states with the nation. Hence it 
provided in Section 2 that “The Con¬ 
gress and the several states shall have 
concurrent power to enforce this ar¬ 


ticle by appropriate legislation.” 
The intention, clearly, was that each 
government should perform that part 
of the task for which it was peculiarly 
fitted. This means that the federal 
effort should concentrate on performing 
the essentially federal function of ex¬ 
cluding smuggling of liquor from 
abroad and dealing with its interstate 
traffic, leaving to the states all intra¬ 
state violations of law. 

The protection of the United States 
against illegal importations from for¬ 
eign countries, as well as the protection 
of each state from the illegal introduc¬ 
tion into it of liquor from another 
state, requires centralized national 
action, and the employment of large 
federal powers. To perform ade¬ 
quately this part of the task requires 
all the resources which Congress makes 
available for enforcement of this law. 
To this part of the whole task of en¬ 
forcement the federal Government 
should, therefore, devote its entire 
energies. 

The burden of dealing with intra¬ 
state conduct belongs to the states. 
To protect the people of a state against 
illegal sale within it of liquor il¬ 
legally manufactured within it is a 
task for which the state governments 
are peculiarly fitted; and which they 
should perform. This part of the 
task involves diversified governmental 
action and adaptation to the widely 
varying conditions in the habits and 
sentiments of the people of the 
several states. It is a task for 
which the federal Government is not 
fitted. 

A National Policy 

The scheme of enforcement here 
outlined gives us a national policy, 
with national administration confined 
to the situations dependent upon fed¬ 
eral control, and decentralized adminis¬ 
tration by the states within their 


A National Folicy for Enforcement of Liquor Laws 


195 


traditional field. This is a distribution 
of responsibility which the states and 
nation, respectively, can discharge; 
this is distribution of authority which 
duly respects differences in sentiment 


in the various states; this is a distri¬ 
bution of authority which the Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment itself contemplated 
and by which alone it can be vindi¬ 
cated. 


The Police Officer’s Difficulties in Enforcing 

Liquor Laws 

By Major Lynn G. Adams 

Superintendent, Pennsylvania State Police 


N ATIONAL prohibition began in 
1919 when the Government re¬ 
stricted the sale of intoxicants as a 
war measure. This restriction was not 
removed. The Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment became a part of the Constitu¬ 
tion, and the Volstead Act a federal 
law in 1919, effective January 16, 1920. 
Statistics from the police records of all 
first-, second- and third-class cities in 
the state of Pennsylvania show a de¬ 
crease in crime and arrests in all cases 
from 40 to 60 per cent when comparing 
1919, 1920 and 1921 with 1916; and a 
corresponding decrease in the number 
of arrests for drunkenness—notwith¬ 
standing the fact that during 1919 
about four million young men were 
turned back into civil life from our 
army, and an ever-increasing popula¬ 
tion. According to this same source 
of information, 1920 and 1921 marked 
the lowest ebb in both arrests for 
all crimes and also for those classified 
as “drunkenness.” Nineteen-twenty- 
two showed a marked increase in total 
arrests over 1921, 1920 and 1919. The 
trend has been steadily upward since 
1921. 

Effect of Lenient Court Sentences 

When the Eighteenth Amendment 
became a part of the Constitution and 
the Volstead Act became a law, with a 
federal agency provided for its enforce¬ 
ment, most of the people of the United 
States believed that it w r ould be a 
serious thing to violate the law. All 
had a wholesome respect for the power 
of the federal Government. Had 
they not heard wonderful tales of 
battles between revenue officers and 


“moonshiners” in the mountains of 
Kentucky and Tennessee? Had they 
not witnessed the swift, certain and 
severe punishment meted out to 
counterfeiters and post-office robbers? 
For a time the inhibitive effect of 
former impressions brought about a 
marked obedience to the law. Then 
followed the arrest and conviction of 
violators, and the courts passed sen¬ 
tence. These sentences amounted to 
small fines. The eyes of every person 
not favorable to the enforcement of 
law were focused upon the action of 
the courts. It did not take this part 
of the population long to discover that 
the fines amounted merely to small 
items of overhead expense in a very 
profitable business. The press of the 
country began to print humorous 
stories of the bootlegger and private 
hooch-maker. The stage and screen 
were not slow to seize upon law viola¬ 
tion as a source of humor, and Vol¬ 
stead Law violation became a mild 
adventure furnishing a thrill for, in 
other respects, good citizens. It be¬ 
came a matter of pride for wealthy and 
eminent citizens to be able to provide, 
as a matter of hospitality, liquor for¬ 
bidden by the law; and competition 
in this respect became so great that all 
kinds of subterfuges were practiced in 
order to obtain a supply. As prices 
went skyward, persons holding liquor 
from pre-war possession realized 
tremendous profits by its sale. As 
this supply did not equal the demand, 
fake drug companies were formed to 
get permits for the withdrawal of liq¬ 
uor from bonded warehouses. Un¬ 
fortunately for the honor of the fed- 


196 


Police Officer's Difficulties in Enforcing Liquor Laws 


197 


eral Government, the enforcement 
agency became a political plum-tree. 
Permits for the withdrawal of liquor 
from bonded warehouses were issued 
to persons not entitled to them; and 
thus grew up the fake drug companies 
which evaded the law. These eva¬ 
sions were nation-wide, and built up 
a bootlegging industry in nearly every 
town in the country. Then came 
more stringent requirements for the 
withdrawal of liquor on permits, on the 
part of the federal Government, with 
the result that the already tremendous 
business was forced to resort to smug¬ 
gling, synthetic manufacture, the rob¬ 
bery of warehouses, counterfeiting of 
permits, and wholesale bribery, in 
order to supply the demand. 

In Pennsylvania, today, most of the 
liquor for sale by bootleggers is moon¬ 
shine and of synthetic manufacture. 
Very little is smuggled, and that which 
is smuggled is invariably adulterated 
with water, alcohol and dyes, increas¬ 
ing its quantity four times. 

Typical Action of Grand Jury 

It is the general belief on the part 
of the public these days that enforce¬ 
ment is a mere matter of police power. 
This would be true if the police had 
arbitrary powers and could dispose of 
each case summarily. 

In Schuylkill County, recently, fifty 
odd liquor violation cases were sub¬ 
mitted to the grand jurors. The evi¬ 
dence in all of them was so nearly alike 
that to describe one practically de¬ 
scribes all of them. Two state police¬ 
men had entered a saloon and pur¬ 
chased liquor. These were followed 
by two others. In each case samples 
were carried away and analyzed by 
competent chemists. The liquor 
proved to be of alcoholic content 
greater than that permitted by the 
law. Information was made before 
a justice of the peace and a warrant 


issued for the arrest of the persons 
making the sale. The state police 
served the warrant in the saloon and 
at that time seized a quantity of liquor 
and beer. Later a bill of indictment 
was drawn and presented by the 
district attorney to the Grand Jury. 
The Grand Jury summoned, the wit¬ 
nesses for the prosecution, and after 
hearing the testimony took a vote, 
which stood eight for indictment 
and twelve against indictment. The 
Grand Jury ignored the bill, and all 
the others met the same fate. 

In many counties the state police, 
with the same kind of evidence, have 
secured indictments by the Grand 
Jury, only to fail when the case was 
tried before a petit jury where the 
agreement must be unanimous. 

It may be that in some cases jurors 
were corrupted, and, speaking from 
personal observation extending over 
eighteen years of experience, the writer 
is certain that this occurs all too fre¬ 
quently. Assuming, however, for the 
sake of argument, that they are not 
corrupted, we must still keep in mind 
the fact that the probabilities are that, 
where 25 per cent or more of a given 
population is opposed to the enforce¬ 
ment of a law, a corresponding pro¬ 
portion is going to find its way into the 
grand and petit juries. 

Court Rulings Hamper Police 

In one county of the state the court 
makes it a rule to give light sentences 
(this judge is openly opposed to the 
Eighteenth Amendment as a law) to 
liquor law violators, thus making it 
doubly difficult for the police, because 
no one in this county is inhibited from 
violating the law. 

In other counties the courts have 
raised almost insurmountable ob¬ 
stacles in the form of legal technicali¬ 
ties. As an instance of this the follow¬ 
ing is an example: 


198 


The Annals of the American Academy 


The court ruled that an automobile 
may not be searched without a search 
warrant. Should the police seize a 
quantity of liquor found in an auto¬ 
mobile which has been detained for a 
violation of the automobile laws, the 
liquor so obtained may not be used as 
evidence in a charge of illegal posses¬ 
sion and transportation, as it was 
not obtained legally, and, consequently, 
the court will order the indictment 
quashed and the liquor restored to the 
owner. 

Not long ago, the state police had 
information that a large quantity of 
liquor was being transported illegally 
by a certain man on a certain night. 
The police had knowledge of this man’s 
operations for a long time, but up un¬ 
til this time never had they been able 
to learn of his operations in time to 
head him off and arrest him while in 
the perpetration of the act. This 
seemed like a good opportunity, so 
they hurried to a magistrate to secure 
a search warrant giving authority to 
search the automobile with which the 
law was being violated. They then 
found that a search warrant would not 
be issued until the offense actually had 
been committed in the county in which 
the magistrate had jurisdiction—in 
other words, until the automobile 
loaded with liquor was actually within 
the jurisdiction of the county and 
speeding toward its destination. In 
this case the state police took the 
magistrate out on the highway and had 
him sign and seal the information and 
warrant the instant the automobile 
entered the county. This, however, 
is not always possible and makes the 
apprehension of persons transporting 
liquor very difficult. 

As another instance, a state police¬ 
man, while making an arrest for an¬ 
other offense, came upon a still in 
operation. He seized the still and 
lodged additional charges against the 


owner. The court ruled that. the 
officer had no legal right to seize the 
still; that he had obtained the knowl¬ 
edge on which he based his informa¬ 
tion illegally and, therefore, ordered 
the still returned to the owner and the 
case dismissed. 

Ten years ago, not a court in the 
state of Pennsylvania would have 
required a chemical analysis to de¬ 
termine whether whisky contained 
alcohol. It was sufficient then to tes¬ 
tify that the witness had drunk whis¬ 
ky before, that he knew whisky by 
taste and smell, and that he asked for 
whisky and received and paid for it, 
to prove an illegal sale. Today, in 
some counties, it requires the testi¬ 
mony of a qualified chemist that he 
has made an analysis and that the 
analysis shows the same to be whisky 
of a certain alcoholic percentage by 
volume. 

To secure a warrant for violations of 
the liquor laws, in certain counties of 
Pennsylvania, the following rules must 
be complied with: 

An affidavit that the law has been 
violated—namely, that the person 
named in the complaint has manu¬ 
factured, sold, or transported liquor, 
containing alcohol of more than one 
half of one per cent by volume, for 
beverage purposes. To make such an 
affidavit the affiant must have “per¬ 
sonal knowledge”; and to satisfy the 
law “personal knowledge” must be of 
the alcoholic content of the liquor. 
Strictly, this is an impossible thing, 
unless some of the liquor has fallen 
into the hands of the police and has 
been analyzed. 

The same kind of affidavit is neces¬ 
sary in order to secure a search war¬ 
rant. Under the law a search war¬ 
rant may not be issued for a private 
dwelling, unless it can be proven that 
sales have been made therein. As a 
result of this condition, carloads of 


Police Officer’s Difficulties in Enforcing Liquor Laws 


199 


medicated alcohol are being sold in the 
mining districts of the state of Penn¬ 
sylvania to persons who take it to 
their homes and re-distill it for personal 
use. So long as the sale of medicated 
alcohol is permitted, there is no way 
that the police can prevent it. 

Two of the most important Acts 
necessary for the enforcement of the 
liquor law in Pennsylvania were de¬ 
feated in the Legislature. One was 
for the licensing and regulating of 
stills; the other, for the licensing and 
regulating of breweries producing 
cereal beverages. Under the present 
ruling of some of the courts, there is 
no way that police can enter a brewery 
unless it can be proved that the said 
brewery manufactures and sells bev¬ 
erages containing more than one half 
of one per cent alcohol by volume. 
The Prohibition Bill passed by the 
1923 Legislature makes it legal for 
brewers to manufacture and have in 
their vats beer that contains a high 
percentage of alcohol during the proc¬ 
ess of manufacture of legal cereal 
beverages. The brewers claim it is 
necessary to make real beer and de- 
alcoholize it in order to make what is 
known as “near beer.” This condition 
makes it almost impossible for the 
police to prevent the clandestine ship¬ 
ments of real beer disguised as “near 
beer” by dishonest brewers. 

Dangers in Collecting Evidence 
Against Violators 

The public at large cannot appreciate 
the difficulties and dangers encount¬ 
ered by an officer collecting evidence 
against liquor law violators. The 
violators as a rule are careful about 
their sales; one must be known to 
them or properly introduced before 
they will take a chance. 

Not long ago one of our men suc¬ 
ceeded in buying a pint of moonshine 
and was about to leave when some¬ 


thing aroused the suspicion of the 
bartender. The latter immediately 
called the local policeman, who placed 
our officer under arrest, and in han¬ 
dling him roughly broke the bottle con¬ 
taining the liquor to be used as evi¬ 
dence. The local officer then placed 
the state policeman in jail charging 
him with being drunk and disorderly. 
Next morning the burgess fined him 
$10. The evidence was all against 
him. We have police knowledge that 
both the burgess and the local police 
are financially interested in the bar 
where the liquor was bought—but 
there is a vast difference between 
“police knowledge” and evidence ac¬ 
ceptable to the court. There is noth¬ 
ing to prevent the deliberate poisoning 
of a police officer who drinks that he 
may obtain evidence, should his iden¬ 
tity become known. To obtain evi¬ 
dence, it is necessary to drink. To 
drink good liquor would not be a 
punishment for many, but the terrible 
stuff that is sold under present condi¬ 
tions makes the drinking thereof slow 
suicide. 

After the evidence is obtained, the 
officer must appear in court, where he 
is subjected to verbal abuse and insult 
in the form of cross-examination and 
in the address to the jury by the de¬ 
fendant's attorney. If the jurors 
happen to be—as they very often are 
—people who are opposed to prohibi¬ 
tion, the verdict is found in favor of the 
defendant and the costs placed on the 
officer. 

When an officer becomes efficient 
and brings about the arrest of vio¬ 
lators in any community, the boot¬ 
leggers and their customers immedi¬ 
ately begin to circulate tales about 
him of graft and other propaganda 
which tend to undermine the con¬ 
fidence of honest people in the in¬ 
tegrity of the police officer, and as a 
result the police officer, who is under- 



200 


The Annals of the American Academy 


paid at the best, often resigns in dis¬ 
gust, while occasionally one proceeds 
on the theory that as he has the 
“name” he may as well have the 
“game.” 

All that has been written before and 
many things which the length of this 
article will not permit lead me to the 
conclusion that perfect police work of 
itself can never bring about satisfactory 
results until it is backed up by judges 
who will support the Constitution and 
honestly do their part by imposing 
adequate sentences, district attorneys 
who are aggressively anxious to get 
results, and jury commissioners who 
will accept only such names for the 


jury wheel as are borne by honest and 
reputable citizens. 

In the state of Pennsylvania very 
little has been done by local police 
departments in the form of an honest 
attempt to enforce the law; conse¬ 
quently, we must have mayors, bur¬ 
gesses and councilmen who will not only 
encourage the police of their cities and 
boroughs to do their part but will 
aggressively demand it. 

Personally, I believe that the power 
called Public Sentiment, which brought 
about the amendment to the Consti¬ 
tution and the enactment of the pro¬ 
hibition laws, can and will eventually 
see to it that these things are done. 


The Human Element in Prohibition Enforcement 

By T. Henry Walnut 

Chairman Workmen’s Compensation Board of Pennsylvania; formerly 

Special Assistant, U. S. Attorney 


T HIS contribution will not venture 
to settle the question of prohibition 
or no prohibition, nor even to offer a 
solution of some of the minor questions 
that have arisen incidental to the main 
one. It will undertake to be a plain 
narrative of experiences as a Federal 
Prosecuting Attorney in the city of 
Philadelphia which, when the “dry” 
edict was issued, was as black as your 
hat on the Anti-Saloon League map and 
projected its black shadow across the 
entire state. Perhaps the map of the 
Liquor Dealers’ Association represented 
it in wdiite—that I do not know, but 
Pennsylvania, however, was legislative¬ 
ly wet without even the qualification of 
local option, and the liquor men at all 
critical moments rode down the opposi¬ 
tion. They were never stronger than 
in 1917, and they felt that there was 
something unfair in the left-handed 
way that Washington unhorsed them 
without giving them a chance to fight. 

The politics of it, though of no 
concern in this article, is of interest as 
background to our local experience. 

War Liquor Laws Enforced 

Just what relation the war had to 
national prohibition is a matter of 
opinion, but, from a Federal Attorney’s 
point of view, the enormous volume of 
new business for his office created by the 
first, was perpetuated by the second, 
under conditions so changed, however, 
as to be remarkable. 

During the war Congress gambled 
recklessly with legislation, and de¬ 
livered extraordinary powers into the 
hands of executives. District Attor¬ 
neys were flooded with new acts, new 
executive orders and proclamations. 

201 


The sheer job of reading them all 
was almost overwhelming. The people 
w r ere required to do this and to refrain 
from doing that, in endless procession, 
and back of everything required of 
them was the Department of Justice 
and the penalties of the law. 

The power of the Department in 
those days was immense. It seemed 
as though we had but to crook a 
finger and men went to jail and stayed 
there until we directed their release. 
Whatever we did was right provided it 
was rough and vindictive. 

To the District Attorney’s office it 
seemed as though the populace had 
banded itself together into one vast 
law enforcement league. We were 
oppressed by the assistance that was 
thrust upon us, and were frequently 
changed from prosecutors to the 
protectors of the persecuted, a role that 
was received with little public approval. 
There was a demand for spies and 
traitors that far outran the supply. 

One feature of our work during the 
war led naturally up to prohibition. 
Under Section twelve of the Selective 
Service Act (the Draft law) the sale or 
furnishing of liquor to men in uniform 
was prohibited, and the Secretaries of 
War and Navy were authorized by 
executive order to prescribe a zone of a 
quarter-mile radius about army and 
navy posts within which no liquor 
should be sold or dispensed. It was a 
qualified sort of prohibition act and the 
story of its enforcement is principally 
interesting by contrast with the later 
problem. 

Section twelve was given the same 
respectful consideration granted other 
war legislation. The saloon keepers, 



American Academy 


202 The Annals of the 

of whom we had over eighteen hundred 
in the city, obeyed it in letter and in 
spirit. Only two were caught in its 
violation and they were promptly 
found guilty and duly committed to 
jail. This record of arrests has an 
entirely different significance from 
what it would have under prohibition. 
We had a million volunteer informants 
to keep us posted in those days, where 
there were none after the war days 
were over. As a result, men in uniform 
were not welcome in barrooms. They 
were watched uneasily from their 
entrance to their exit. 

Suggestions made by the District 
Attorney to assure a more complete 
observance of the law were accepted 
almost without a murmur. The sale 
of “half pints” was abstained from 
because of the readiness with which 
they could be disposed of to a sailor 
waiting outside at the corner of an 
alley. Hotel keepers agreed not to 
deliver liquor to rooms taken by 
uniformed men, nor to tables where men 
in uniform were seated. 

The liquor dealers may subsequently 
have become persistent violators of law, 
but during the war, they bowed as low 
before it as did any of our citizens. 

Comes the Bootlegger 

There was another matter of con¬ 
trast between this foretaste of prohi¬ 
bition and the reality. It lay in the 
character of the violators. We called 
them bootleggers for want of a better 
name, with a sense of drawing a foreign 
word into our speech, for that term had 
then no application in Philadelphia. 
They were a sorry lot. The very 
dregs of humanity: vagrants, drifters, 
down-and-outs, who were slipped a 
dollar bill, purchased a half pint 
(before that trade was ended), de¬ 
livered their purchase in the shadow 
of an alley and kept the change. They 
didn’t do it as a business; they were 


persuaded into it usually. Sometimes 
they did it because they had themselves 
been in the army in Spanish War days 
and wanted to help a buddy. Even 
at that their sentences were as severe 
as those imposed on later-day gentle¬ 
men, who made fortunes out of the 
same merchandise. 

To the best of my recollection we 
never caught one who could properly 
be said to have been engaged in the 
business. 

There was certainly nothing in this 
preliminary experience to prepare us 
for what was to come later. 

A change came with the signing of 
the Armistice. You might call it a 
reaction or you might call it simply a 
return to normal. Anyway, vendors 
of liquor no longer felt any obligation 
to refrain from selling to men in 
uniform and, what was more, the 
public no longer felt under obligation 
to report what it saw. 

And Now the Volstead Law 

The Armistice was scarcely signed 
and the rigors of the war regulations 
relaxed when the war prohibition act 
of November 21, 1918, was passed, 
forbidding the manufacture of liquor 
after April 1, and its sale after July 1 of 
1919. 

It is a slow process changing tradi¬ 
tional habits and points of view by 
legislation, and the tradition that the 
drinking of liquor was a necessary part 
of the life of man, and the sale of it an 
inherent fundamental right, was fixed 
in our community. 

The liquor men could read the new 
law, but they couldn’t believe it to be 
true. Shortly before July 1 of 1919, a 
delegation from the Retail Liquor 
Dealers’ Association called on the 
United States District Attorney. 
Their president, who had a somewhat 
broader view of the situation than the 
others, had induced the passage of a 



The Human Element in Prohibition Enforcement 


203 


resolution requiring all members of the 
association to cease selling at midnight 
of June 30. He was insistent that the 
retail liquor dealers were a law-abiding 
group of citizens, they had shown it 
during the war and would show it again 
by the respect they would accord the 
new federal mandate. He also sug¬ 
gested as a footnote to his main 
reasons that if the community wanted 
to be “dry” they could be “dry”—and 
be damned. 

If liquor was really taken away he 
was convinced such a howl would go up 
that Congress would hastily give back 
the bottle. 

I have often wondered what the 
result would be if prohibition had 
really prohibited. The issue of “wet” 
and “dry” has not as yet been dis¬ 
tinctly raised. We have somehow 
always contrived to have our prohibi¬ 
tion and our liquor, too. 

However, the Retail Liquor Dealers’ 
Association was as good as its word. 
The local papers displayed commend¬ 
able zeal in listing all the open saloons; 
on July 1 they totalled about two 
hundred (non-members of the Associa¬ 
tion) out of eighteen hundred, but the 
score mounted rapidly, and at the end 
of two weeks there was no longer any 
merit in the tally, for the saloons were 
practically all open. 

It was a new experience to a Federal 
Prosecuting Attorney. Theretofore 
the federal laws had been granted more 
respect than local laws. There had 
been about the federal processes of 
justice an impersonal relentlessness 
that was dreaded even by the profes¬ 
sional criminal. But this respect 
passed with the development of pro¬ 
hibition. 

What perhaps was worse than the 
disrespect of the violators was the 
antagonism of the public. The com¬ 
munity enforcement league that backed 
us up during the war not only dis¬ 


banded as an active aid, but turned 
its back upon us. The volunteers 
vanished completely. Once it had 
been a patriotic duty and a distinction 
to be an informant; now the man who 
bore testimony was a “rat.” 

This opprobrium attached not only 
to the volunteer but the agent as well, 
perhaps not as fully, as there was some 
understanding that he was earning his 
living, but still it was strong enough to 
make the better men in the Depart¬ 
ment of Justice and Internal Revenue, 
who originally carried the burden of 
enforcement, reluctant about engaging 
in the business. 

I remember one instance of a 
gentlemanly fellow from the South, 
an agent of the Department of Justice, 
who was asked to get a “buy” on a 
saloon keeper in the immediate vicin¬ 
ity of the post office. He rebelled 
promptly. He knew the saloon keeper, 
he stopped at this saloon every night 
on his way home, and had a drink. If 
the Department expected him to 
become “a dirty rat,” he was done 
with the Department. We tactfully 
waived the issue by selecting some one 
else to do the buying, who was not a 
regular customer. 

The Federal Service Succumbs to 
Temptation 

Shortly we began to have further 
new experiences. The old federal 
service had built up a tradition of 
honesty, and steady-going insistence 
on duty. The tradition had been 
growing for a generation with the 
growth of the classified service. 

Occasionally agents had gone wrong, 
particularly where the service brushed 
up against liquor, dope and vice, but 
for the most part we trusted our men 
implicitly. Before prohibition was 
five months old we were met with the 
difficulty that has most seriously 
affected enforcement. The men began 


204 


The Annals of the American Academy 


to go bad. Two were found “shaking 
down” saloon keepers for small sums: 
five to fifty dollars. They were fore¬ 
runners of a host of successors. 

By the time the constitutional 
amendment was ready to go into effect 
on January 16, 1920, the situation had 
long since passed beyond control. We 
were profoundly disturbed at first and 
strained feverishly to hold it in check. 
We quit worrying after awhile and 
took the situation philosophically. 

There was a faint hope that the 
coming of constitutional prohibition 
would help the situation. We were 
much assured by reading the Volstead 
Act. It was so complete in its arma¬ 
ment of attack and defense. People 
might defy a statute, passed in aid of a 
war, that was dead, but they surely 
would be sobered by the mandate of 
the Constitution. 

We soon discovered the truth, how¬ 
ever. The new and ingenious devices 
contrived by the new law to regulate 
the use of liquor for legitimate pur¬ 
poses, and to prevent the manufacture, 
sale and use of the same liquor for 
beverage purposes, simply added in¬ 
finite variety to the means of crooked¬ 
ness. It wasn’t only the law that was 
broken, it was every rule of ordinary 
decency among men. 

It is impossible to tell in sequence 
the development of the situation. We 
didn’t know. But within a year we 
did know that the whole system 
had fallen into a state of demorali¬ 
zation and that an enormous busi¬ 
ness had been developed outside of 
the law. 

The saloon keepers were still doing 
business—about fifteen hundred out 
of the eighteen hundred were still 
solemnly going into court and secur¬ 
ing licenses to conduct the business of 
selling one half of one per cent bever¬ 
ages. They paid a thousand dollars a 
year for those licenses, and it was a 


matter of common knowledge that they 
were all selling more or less openly, and 
that the license merely gave a degree 
of judicial sanction to their illicit 
traffic. This law, it should be stated, 
was repealed by the Pennsylvania 
Legislature of 1923 on the insistent 
demand of Governor Pinchot. In 
addition to their county license they 
began securing permits from the Pro¬ 
hibition Bureau at Washington, to sell 
intoxicating liquors for medicinal pur¬ 
poses, one of the early absurdities of the 
regulations. A brisk business promptly 
arose in the securing of permits. Ex¬ 
internal revenue officers acted as in¬ 
termediaries and for a matter of five to 
seven hundred dollars provided prompt 
deliveries of permits. The saloon 
keepers grumbled and added this 
additional item to their overhead. 

There was also a feeling, which with¬ 
in the year grew to conviction, that the 
agents entrusted to prevent selling had 
sold themselves out to the enemy. 
How many had gone bad no one knew. 
But a fair proportion had been cor¬ 
rupted, certainly enough to destroy 
faith in the entire force. Common gos¬ 
sip in the corridors of the federal build¬ 
ing remarked that everyone in the busi¬ 
ness paid for protection. Sometimes, 
he paid and was arrested anyhow, and 
then his bitterness was without bounds. 
Sometimes, he refused to pay and was 
raided or arrested for his refusal. All 
were more or less guilty, so a nominal 
case was readily prepared. 

The business of being a prohibition 
agent was rated so profitable that a 
crew of petty crooks, pickpockets, dope 
sellers and the like provided themselves 
with false badges and false warrants 
and went around preying on the fears 
of the retail dealers, collecting money 
to squash hypothetical cases, and 
either seizing and making off with 
liquor or accepting considerable sums 
for refraining from doing so. As every- 


The Human Element in Prohibition Enforcement 


205 


body was outside of the law, there were 
very few complaints made. This 
rather lurid development faded out of 
the picture as the dealers in liquor 
became wiser in the ways of the law. 

The “Permit” Game 

The retail liquor business, however, 
shortly became a secondary issue to the 
new wholesale industry that developed 
to enormous proportions. Its first and 
most spectacular feature centered about 
the withdrawal of whisky and alcohol 
from distilleries and warehouses on 
permits issued by the state prohibition 
directors. 

I have forgotten how much whisky 
there w r as in storage on January 16, 
1920, but it ran to many million gallons, 
fifty or sixty, I believe. The law and 
the regulations provided for its release 
for medicinal and incidental purposes, 
but the force drawing it out for bever¬ 
age uses was simply irresistible. It 
w r as stolen in small quantities and in 
truck loads. It w^as passed out on 
forged permits and on permits fraud¬ 
ulently issued. 

The latter was the method most 
extensively used. It required the 
collusion of someone in the State Pro¬ 
hibition Director’s Office, who would 
issue the necessary papers over the 
Director’s signature. 

Originally, the rules governing the is¬ 
suance of these permits were extremely 
lax, and there was little chance of catch¬ 
ing anyone at it. Moreover, the per¬ 
mits were readily forged. But as the 
rules became more stringent, forgeries 
were more difficult, and the persons 
who could issue permits became limited 
to the Director and his chief subordi¬ 
nates. 

The value of these permits was com¬ 
puted by the amount of liquor they 
released. The price varied extensively, 
but during a period in 1921 with which 
I am familiar, the prices commonly 


quoted were eighteen to twenty 
dollars a case. I have seen four per¬ 
mits that had been issued at one time 
releasing ten thousand cases. 

The ease and quickness with which 
fortunes could be made accounted for 
persistent succumbing of state directors 
and their offices to temptation. 

The New York and the Pennsylvania 
offices have changed control six times 
in the past three years and a half. 
Each has had one director and numer¬ 
ous subordinates indicted for fraud in 
connection w T ith permits. 

Coupled with the temptation of 
extraordinary sums of money there 
were political influences of importance. 
The value of the office of the state 
director of prohibition as a political 
asset w r as soon demonstrated. It 
could control numerous highly de¬ 
sirable appointments, could afford 
protection to favored persons and pro¬ 
vide permits in payment of political 
debts, and, what w r as still more im¬ 
portant, could collect unlimited sums 
of money for campaign purposes. 

Control of the office was eagerly 
sought by political leaders. The Re¬ 
publican leaders were alive to those 
considerations, and their original 
selections both in New York and 
Philadelphia were of men prominent in 
political life,—Judge Harte and Sen¬ 
ator McConnell. Neither one lasted 
more than a few months and both were 
indicted within a year from the date of 
their appointment for the fraudulent 
issue of permits, and in both cases there 
was a persistent rumor that the money 
collected on the permits was intended 
in part at least to be applied to im¬ 
portant political purposes, one of which 
in Pennsylvania w T as the accumulation 
of a fund of great size for the election 
of a governor in the following year. 

However true the specific rumors 
may have been as to the political 
reasons involved, it is undoubted that 


206 


The Annals of the American Academy 


enormous quantities of liquor were 
withdrawn from the distilleries upon 
fraudulent permits and that enormous 
sums of money were paid for the per¬ 
mits. The permits so issued by the 
Pennsylvania office in a period of sixty 
days called for seven hundred thousand 
gallons of whisky and alcohol. The 
corruption fund arising from these 
papers must have run close to four 
million dollars, which price was added 
to the cost of the liquor that was with¬ 
drawn and bootlegged. 

The power of money in such amounts 
to interfere with the customary proc¬ 
esses of justice is a matter of grave 
concern. Moreover, when an investiga¬ 
tion was made in 1921 into the opera¬ 
tions of the prohibition office and of the 
liquor dealers who operated through it, 
the number of persons directly involved 
was disturbing and the ramifications 
of the business reached into all quarters 
of the state. In the foreground of the 
picture were five or six dealers, who 
within a year had lifted themselves 
from very moderate circumstances to a 
position of wealth. They had purchased 
one distillery after another which they 
proceeded to clean out on fraudulent 
permits. Back of them were smaller 
dealers, wholesale and retail, and a vast 
number of drivers and general aides and 
assistants, and finally the purchasers 
themselves, who were a trifle proud of 
their ability to buy liquor. 

There were prohibition officials 
directly involved and a procession of 
names of men occupying the most 
responsible positions in the state and 
nation,, some of whom were so closely 
connected as to be just on the edge of 
prosecution. 

It seemed from an inside view that 
the community was in a vast conspir¬ 
acy against itself. 

I am told that the “permit” game, 
as it was euphoniously called, is nearly 
dead now. The regulations governing 


the issuance of permits have been 
made progressively more strict, and the 
available whisky in the distilleries has 
turned into water, but new methods of 
procedure have developed. Smug¬ 
gling, which was comparatively limited 
in 1920 and 1921, has become almost a 
standardized business. 

Alcohol, which becomes whisky by 
the addition of water and coloring 
matter, is now an important factor in 
the business. The alcohol is presumed 
to be denatured. To conduct this 
business on a large scale, with safety, 
inspectors, agents, gaugers and higher 
officials must be “fixed.” 

Moreover, there are the brewers 
whose story in 1921 was not quite so 
sensational as that which centered 
about the distilleries, but they were 
doing business nevertheless, and are 
still doing it. I received a report 
recently which listed some fifteen 
breweries in Philadelphia alone that 
were making beer containing more than 
the legal amount of alcohol. To do 
this and to “get away with it,” many 
more public officers had to be placed on 
private pay rolls. 

The money that has been expended 
in the past few years in the corruption 
of the federal service is incalculable. 
It must run to enormous figures. When 
I consider the value of “permits” to 
withdraw, the value of protection in the 
illicit sale and the illicit manufacture 
of liquor and the readiness of the 
dealers to pay for what they want, I 
do not wonder that prohibition en¬ 
forcement has gone lame and the 
federal service in spots corrupt. 

The Public Conscience is 
Enforcement 

The combination of politics and 
money is a hard one to fight, for it 
reaches everywhere and is vastly more 
potent than the efforts of any individ¬ 
ual in the service. 


The Human Element in Prohibition Enforcement 


207 


Seen from the inside, a big liquor 
prosecution was a continual struggle 
between the old federal machine which 
moved steadily along its accustomed 
track and the combination of forces 
which attempted by any means to 
derail it. 

Back of the whole trouble, of course, 
is the conscience of the community. 
So long as the people insist on buying, 
there will be somebody to sell. I 
sometimes wondered, when I heard men 
talking boastfully of the liquor they 


purchased whether they realized the 
infinite varieties of trickery, crooked¬ 
ness, perjury, bribery and corruption 
that preceded the simple violation of 
law incident to the sale of the liquor to 
them, all induced in order to satisfy 
their desires. If they had, perhaps 
they would have been less self-satisfied 
with their purchase. 

The buying of liquor like the receiv¬ 
ing of stolen goods should be bad form 
in society. When that is true enforce¬ 
ment can stand up and walk like a man. 


World-Wide Progress Toward Prohibition Legislation 

By Ernest H. Cherrington, LL.D., Litt.D. 

General Secretary of the World League Against Alcoholism 


T HE economic aspects of prohibi¬ 
tion, as applied to the beverage 
liquor traffic, are likely to prove the 
determining factor in the question as 
to whether prohibition as a govern¬ 
mental policy will prevail around the 
world. This is a commercial age. 
The law T of economic necessity is bound 
to play an important part in dictating 
the future policy of leading commercial 
nations, and consequently the general 
policy of the w r orld. Prohibition in 
the United States of America presents 
the greatest experiment of its kind ever 
attempted by any great world power. 
If prohibition in the United States, 
therefore, proves to be permanent and 
successful from a general economic 
point of view, prohibition in other 
countries of the world will probably 
follow in response to the imperative 
demand of economic law. If, on the 
other hand, prohibition in the United 
States should be only temporary and 
should prove to be an economic failure, 
those facts would affect the commercial 
world in such a way and to such an ex¬ 
tent that progress toward prohibition 
legislation in other countries would be 
retarded or suspended and prohibition 
even in the United States of America 
would eventually be repealed. Hence 
the progress toward prohibition legis¬ 
lation in the several countries of the 
world will be largely influenced and 
probably finally determined by the 
results of the experiment in the United 
States of America, which already has 
become the world’s prohibition lab¬ 
oratory. 

Two important factors, in addition 
to those which characterized the move¬ 


ment for prohibition in the United 
States of America, will of necessity 
affect the progress of prohibition legis¬ 
lation in other countries. The first of 
these factors is that which is presented 
in the form of a strongly organized 
international liquor traffic, having be¬ 
hind it vast wealth and political influ¬ 
ence such as the combined national 
liquor organizations in the United 
States of America never had. 

The second important factor is that 
presented by the agricultural, com¬ 
mercial and trade phases of the wine 
industry of the world. The extent to 
which the vineyard and wine industry 
of France enters into the agricultural 
and international trade problems of 
that country is nothing short of appall¬ 
ing. In 1920 France had under vines 
3,726,620 acres, with an annual pro¬ 
duction of wine amounting to 1,300,- 
200,000 gallons. The little country of 
Portugal produces each year more than 
110,000,000 gallons of wine, much of 
which must find a market outside that 
country. Spain in 1920 had a total 
area under vines of 3,289,714 acres 
and produced in that year 706,756,116 
gallons of wine, which is more than one 
sixth of the entire world’s production. 
This was an increase over Spain’s pro¬ 
duction for the year 1919 of more than 
150,000,000 gallons. 

Such significant facts, together w T ith 
the further fact that the wine industry 
is an important factor in most of the 
countries of Southern Europe and 
Northern Africa, and that it is rapidly 
developing in South Africa, Australia, 
and certain portions of Latin America, 
must be taken into account in connec- 


208 


World-Wide Progress Toward Prohibition Legislation 


209 


tion with any fair study of progress 
toward prohibition legislation. 

Evolution of Prohibition in the 
United States 

During a period of slightly more 
than a quarter of a century, efforts to 
secure effective prohibition legislation 
in the United States have passed 
through six successive stages. In the 
first stage, prohibition was applied 
to the sale of intoxicating liquors to 
minors, drunkards, and on holidays, 
Sundays, and specified hours in the day. 
The second stage witnessed the applica¬ 
tion of prohibition through the local 
veto method, to precincts, townships, 
towns and villages. During the third 
stage the local option method was used 
in expanded form so that prohibition 
might be applied to the district, county 
or parish as a unit. The application of 
prohibition to the state as a unit 
characterized the fourth stage. Pro¬ 
hibition by Congress of the use of inter¬ 
state commerce for intoxicating liquors 
intended to be used in the violation of 
the laws of any state, thus giving 
the largest possible degree of state 
sovereignty on the question of prohib¬ 
iting or regulating the liquor traffic, 
characterized the fifth stage of the 
movement. An iron-clad prohibitory 
amendment to the federal Constitution, 
the enactment of stringent prohibition 
enforcement laws by the federal Con¬ 
gress and the several state legislatures, 
were the outstanding features of the 
sixth stage. 

The United States of America is at 
the present time in what might well be 
termed the seventh stage of the prog¬ 
ress of prohibition legislation, in that at 
present those interested in the success 
of prohibition are directing their efforts 
in both national and state legislative 
bodies to insuring reasonable enforce¬ 
ment of the law, to making the evasion 
of prohibition as difficult as possible 


and to preventing nullification of the 
law in those local sections where public 
sentiment is not yet favorable to pro¬ 
hibition. 

As a result of this general method of 
gradual approach to national prohibi¬ 
tion, the sentiment favorable to the 
maintenance of prohibition, through 
every stage of the movement in Ameri¬ 
ca, has been sufficiently strong to pre¬ 
vent serious reaction and to encourage 
progress. Consequently, before na¬ 
tional constitutional prohibition went 
into effect in the United States of 
America at midnight on January 16, 
1920, more than 90 per cent of the 
townships and rural precincts, 85 per 
cent of the counties and more than 75 
per cent of the villages of the United 
States were already under prohibition 
by state legislation. Two thirds of the 
members of the Senate of the United 
States and more than 70 per cent of the 
members of the Lower House of Con¬ 
gress represented states or districts 
that were under prohibition by state 
enactments. In fact, as a result of the 
operation of local option and state 
prohibitory measures, 70 per cent of the 
population of the United States and 
more than 95 per cent of the land area 
were already under prohibition leg¬ 
islation. National prohibition, there¬ 
fore, did not materially change condi¬ 
tions in the greater part of the country 
and with a large majority of the people. 
It did directly and radically affect 30 
per cent of the population of the United 
States, and less than 5 per cent of the 
land area. 

Progress Toward Prohibition in 
Other Countries 

When it is borne in mind that the 
United States of America was the first 
great nation to adopt prohibition as a 
national legislative policy, and when 
it is remembered also that prior to 
that time very few countries of the 


15 


210 


The Annals of the American Academy 


world had even seriously considered 
the possibility of prohibition as a 
method of dealing with the evils of the 
liquor traffic, and when it is further 
recalled that even the religious forces, 
which were an important factor in the 
American prohibition movement, had 
not taken a stand on prohibition in 
most other countries of the world, the 
comparatively meager progress that 
has been made toward prohibition 
legislation in other parts of the world 
during the past few years, is in reality 
nothing short of remarkable. 

The following brief statements re¬ 
garding the several countries where 
advance legislation has been recently 
enacted or attempted, suggest some¬ 
thing of progress. 

The Dominion of Canada 

Eight of the eleven provinces of the 
Dominion of Canada, including New¬ 
foundland, are under provincial pro¬ 
hibition. The questions of manu¬ 
facture, inter-province transportation, 
and exportation of intoxicating liq¬ 
uors, are phases of the liquor question 
which in the main belong to the Domin¬ 
ion Government, while most other 
phases of the liquor problem are 
controlled by the provincial govern¬ 
ments. 

Prince Edward Island w T ent under 
prohibition in 1907 and for many 
years was the only prohibition province 
in Canada. Saskatchewan followed, 
with a province-wide prohibitory law 
in 1915. The prohibitory laws of 
Ontario, Alberta and Nova Scotia be¬ 
came effective in 1916, while those of 
New Brunswick and Newfoundland 
followed in 1917. A vote taken in 
Yukon Territory on February 25, 1920 
resulted in the adoption of prohibition 
in that territory. 

British Columbia and Manitoba 
both adopted prohibition by popular 
vote in 1916. British Columbia, how¬ 


ever, substituted state control in 1921 
and Manitoba adopted a similar policy 
by a vote of the people in the summer 
of 1923. 

On February 7, 1918, the provincial 
legislature of Quebec enacted a pro¬ 
hibitory law to become effective on 
May 1, 1919. This law was referred to 
a vote of the people, taken on April 7, 
1919, with the result that provincial 
prohibition was defeated. Later the 
province of Quebec adopted a policy 
of government control which remains 
in effect. 

A referendum taken in the province 
of Ontario on October 20, 1919, after 
three years of prohibition, resulted in 
a majority of 433,508 against the re¬ 
peal of prohibition and a majority of 
243,154 against a proposal for state 
control. 

Latin America 

One of the provisions of the Consti¬ 
tution of the Republic of Mexico binds 
all local governments to enact laws for 
the restriction of the liquor traffic. 
The federal government of Mexico, 
by provisions enacted in 1919, greatly 
strengthened the regulatory laws and 
curtailed the traffic and sale of intox¬ 
icating liquors. The raising of the tax 
on the manufacture of alcohol, by ac¬ 
tion of the federal government, has 
resulted in a decided decrease in the 
number of distilleries operating in the 
Republic. President Obregon in 1922 
announced his interest in the plan to 
put an end to the manufacture of pul¬ 
que and mescal, and created a com¬ 
mission to consider the question of 
destroying the maguey plant, from 
which pulque is produced. 

Several states of Mexico have fol¬ 
lowed the lead of the Educational De¬ 
partment of the federal government at 
Mexico City, by adopting a strong 
program providing for temperance 
instruction in the public schools. The 


World-Wide Progress Toward Prohibition Legislation 


211 


states of Sonora, Monterey, Puebla, 
Vera Cruz and Oaxaca are making 
especially rapid progress in connection 
with this program. 

The state of Sonora has been under 
prohibition for several years. Early 
in 1922 the state of Oaxaca increased 
the tax on alcoholic liquors from 50 
per cent to 200 per cent, raised the cost 
of licenses from 30 to 1,000 pesos, and 
placed a 2 per cent treasury tax on all 
sales of alcoholic liquors. The Oaxaca 
law also provides for the separation of 
liquor selling places from all other 
lines of business. 

Something of the tendency toward 
prohibition in Central America is in¬ 
dicated by the statement of the Presi¬ 
dent of Costa Rica, Senor Julia Acosta, 
after his inaugural in 1920. He sent 
from the executive capital to the heads 
of public offices the following declara¬ 
tion: 

On special recommendation of the Presi¬ 
dent of the Republic, we urge you to ob¬ 
serve strict vigilance over the office per¬ 
sonnel with regard to inebriety, abiding 
immediately by the following inflexible 
rules: First, in the future, no person sub¬ 
ject to alcoholic vice must be proposed for 
an appointment as a civil or military em¬ 
ployee; second, the personnel dependent on 
the executive power is notified that intoxica¬ 
tion even in occasional forms cannot be 
tolerated; third, in consequence, an em¬ 
ployee of this dependence who publicly 
incurs in this great fault will be deprived of 
his office, regardless of his personal ante¬ 
cedents, family circumstances, or skill and 
ability in the performance of his duty. 

The new regulatory law of Panama 
adopted on March 1, 1919, raised the 
license fee for the sale of intoxicating 
liquors to $1,800 a year. The effect 
of this law has been to reduce the 
number of licenses in Panama from 680 
to 100. 

President Alessandri of Chile is one 
of the foremost prohibition advocates 
in South America. In the recent Pan- 


American Congress at Santiago, the 
President of the Chilean Republic 
strongly advocated that efforts be 
made toward the suppression of the 
beverage liquor traffic. The legal 
restrictions adopted by the Govern¬ 
ment of Chile in 1919 and 1920 have 
greatly decreased the sale of intoxicat¬ 
ing liquors in that country. 

The President of Paraguay, under 
authority of the law, recently has es¬ 
tablished a number of prohibition zones 
in different parts of that Republic. It 
is understood that the attitude of the 
Government is that the establishing of 
these prohibition zones is the first step 
in a national movement toward prohibi¬ 
tion. 

The Congress of the Republic of 
Uruguay, in May, 1920, passed a law 
providing for scientific temperance in¬ 
struction in the public schools and pro¬ 
viding also for the admission into the 
country, duty free, of all non-intoxicat¬ 
ing drinks. This same law also pro¬ 
hibits the manufacture and sale of 
absinthe, and makes unlawful the sale 
of distilled liquors in the vicinity of 
Uruguayan courts, in the market and 
theater, and to women, children, 
soldiers and civil guards. 

During the year 1921 the anti-liquor 
laws of Peru were greatly strengthened 
by the adoption of provisions for the 
punishment of officials who fail to en¬ 
force the laws, and providing for the 
separation of places where liquors are 
sold from the sale of other articles. 
The laws of Peru provide for scientific 
temperance instruction in the primary 
and secondary schools, and the prohibi¬ 
tion of the sale of alcoholic beverages in 
all establishments and places open to 
the public, on Saturdays and Sundays. 

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, went under a 
new license law, in December, 1920, 
which law provides for the closing of 
drink shops at 7 o’clock in the evening. 
As a result of the operation of this law, 


212 


The Annals of the American Academy 


the police records show a decided fall¬ 
ing off in crime. 

In a recent law passed by Colombia, 
control of the production, sale and con¬ 
sumption of distilled and fermented 
liquors is placed with the departmental 
assemblies. The alcohol monopoly is 
administered by the government de¬ 
partments. The importation of wines 
which contain ethers or artificial ex¬ 
tracts, or alcohol other than that pro¬ 
duced by grape sugar fermentation, is 
prohibited, as is also the importation of 
artificial cognac, beers containing more 
than 4 per cent in volume of alcohol, 
absinthe, and similar intoxicating 
liquors. 

Great Britain 

The Intoxicating Liquor Bill, in¬ 
troduced by Lady Astor and considered 
by the British Parliament in June, 
1923, appears likely to pass, the in¬ 
dications being that the Government is 
agreeable to its adoption by Parlia¬ 
ment and that it will not probably ex¬ 
perience serious difficulty in the House 
of Lords. This bill provides against 
the sale of intoxicating liquors to any 
person under the age of 18 years and 
against the purchase of intoxicating 
liquors by any such person, the excep¬ 
tion being the sale, purchase or supply 
of beer, porter, cider or perry to or by a 
person over the age of 16 years, where 
such liquor is sold, supplied or purchased, 
only for consumption at a meal to be con¬ 
sumed at the same time in such portion 
of the premises as is usually set apart for 
the service of meals, not being known as 
a bar. This provision, if adopted, will 
apply to England, Wales and Scotland. 

Under the Scottish local option law, 
passed by the British Parliament in 
1913, the first series of elections were 
held in 1920. Under the Scottish law, 
55 per cent of the votes recorded, and 
35 per cent of the voters on the regis¬ 
ter, are required to adopt a no-license 


policy. A majority of the votes re¬ 
corded, and 35 per cent of the voters on 
the register, are sufficient to provide for 
limiting and restricting the traffic. 

Under the terms of the Scottish 
local option law an election can be 
called by the petition of one tenth of 
the electors in any district. Elections, 
however, cannot be held more fre¬ 
quently than every three years. 

As a result of the first elections under 
the Scottish Temperance Act, held in 
1920, 27 burghs and 8 counties, making 
35 places in all, voted limitation of the 
liquor traffic, while 27 burghs and 14 
counties, making 41 places in all, voted 
for prohibition. The total vote in all 
the elections held, for no change, was 
708,672. The total vote for limitation 
was 19,407, and the total vote for pro¬ 
hibition was 453,317. Under the local 
option act, there are in Scotland 1,215 
voting areas. Of this number, how¬ 
ever, 308 were already under prohibi¬ 
tion, before the taking of this poll. All 
but two of these 308 are in county areas. 
As a net result of the adoption of prohi¬ 
bition in the 41 burghs and counties, in 
the 1920 poll, 315 licenses were cancelled. 
In addition, the burghs and parishes 
voting for limitation gave instructions 
for the further reduction of licenses to 
the number of 131. 

The Intoxicating Liquor Bill for 
Northern Ireland, which comprises 
Belfast and the six northern counties 
of Ireland, was passed in June, 1923, 
and went into effect on Sunday, June 
15, 1923. This law provides for Sun¬ 
day closing of liquor shops, the aboli¬ 
tion of spirits groceries with compensa¬ 
tion to be paid on a five-year basis, 
restrictions on the sale of methylated 
spirits, the strengthening of the pro¬ 
hibition of illicit distillation, the raising 
of the age limit, the abolition of the 
“bona-fide traveller” privilege, and 
the curtailing of liquor hawking. The 
organized temperance forces of North- 


World-Wide Progress Toward Prohibition Legislation 


213 


ern Ireland are pressing for a local 
option law. 

The Legislature of the Isle of Man 
has passed a law providing for the 
complete closing of licensed rooms on 
Sunday, except to residents in hotels. 
The law also prohibits the serving of 
alcoholic liquors to persons under 18 
years of age, and reduces the week 
day hours for opening in the winter to 
nine hours a day, and in the summer 
to thirteen hours a day. 

Northern Europe 

The government of Norway for the 
last several years has prohibited by 
law the manufacture, sale or importa¬ 
tion of intoxicating liquors containing 
as much, or more than, 14 per cent 
of absolute alcohol. This law was 
adopted in response to the demand of 
the people, as the result of a referen¬ 
dum held in October, 1919, upon the 
question of making permanent the 
prohibition of the beverage liquor 
traffic that had been effective during 
the war period, the result of that ref¬ 
erendum being a majority of 184,344 
in favor of continuing prohibition in 
Norway. The vote stood 489,017 for 
prohibition, and 304,673 against pro¬ 
hibition. 

Economic pressure brought to bear 
by France, Spain and Portugal affect¬ 
ing the trade treaties between those 
countries and Norway finally com¬ 
pelled the Norwegian Government to 
agree to purchase a certain quantity 
of spirits and strong wines each year. 
France, Spain and Portugal all termi¬ 
nated their trade treaties with Norway, 
then under threat of closing the mar¬ 
kets of these three countries to Nor¬ 
wegian fish products, compelled the 
Norwegian Government to become 
responsible for buying a large quan¬ 
tity of intoxicating liquors from these 
three countries. The Norwegian Gov¬ 
ernment in 1922 yielded in part 


to this demand, and when the question 
came up for decision in the Norwegian 
Parliament in March, 1923, and that 
body faced the necessity of buying 
outright from these three wine-pro¬ 
ducing countries a yearly quantity of 
strong drinks amounting to 1,850,000 
liters, the economic difficulty was so 
great that, by a narrow margin in both 
Houses of the Parliament, the prohibi¬ 
tion of wines containing up to 21 per 
cent of alcohol was lifted. Thus there 
is presented a glaring illustration on 
the part of the governments of France, 
Spain and Portugal, of the violation of 
the principle of self-determination for 
small countries. 

Twice prior to the World War, Fin¬ 
land adopted prohibition of the bev¬ 
erage liquor traffic, but in each case 
the act was vetoed by the Czar of 
Russia, who acted in each case under 
the threat of French interests to with¬ 
draw vast loans from Russia if Finnish 
prohibition were permitted. When, 
however, Finland became an independ¬ 
ent country in 1917, prohibition was 
again enacted and became operative 
on June 12, 1919. A strong enforce¬ 
ment code was adopted by the Parlia¬ 
ment of Finland and became effective 
on August 15, 1919. In spite of great 
difficulties to enforce the law against 
liquor smugglers and in spite of terrific 
economic pressure brought to bear 
by France and other wine-producing 
countries, Finland has been able to 
make real progress in the enforcement 
of the law. 

In the recent session of the Finnish 
Parliament a proposal was introduced 
calling for a plebiscite on the question 
of continuing prohibition. The bill 
was referred to a committee which, 
after consideration, reported by a 
majority of 16 to 1 that in view of the 
fact that all elections held in recent 
years had shown a tremendous major¬ 
ity in favor of prohibition, no such 


214 


The Annals of the American Academy 


plebiscite should be held. The opin¬ 
ion of the committee prevailed. 

A referendum on national prohibi¬ 
tion for Sweden was held on August 
27, 1922. National prohibition was 
defeated by a margin of 35,796 votes, 
the result of the vote being 889,028 
for prohibition to 924,874 against pro¬ 
hibition. It is a significant fact in 
this connection that while only 40 per 
cent of the males voted for prohibi¬ 
tion, 57 per cent of the females was 
recorded for the national prohibition 
policy. It is also significant that aside 
from the city of Stockholm the country 
voted for prohibition by a majority of 
90,000. Most of Sweden has been 
under prohibition for many years by 
reason of local option provisions. 

Sweden for the last several years has 
been under the so-called Bratt System, 
by which the retail sale of alcoholic 
liquors is in the hands of special soci¬ 
eties that must pay all their profits, 
over a certain per cent, to the state. 
Every citizen, with the exception of 
drunkards, paupers and criminals, is 
permitted to use an order book through 
which he may purchase a limited quan¬ 
tity of distilled liquors every month. 
The reports of the local authorities on 
the operation of the Bratt System show 
that the number of smugglers punished 
increased under this system from 105 
in 1919 to 2,056 in 1922, and that the 
liters of whisky confiscated under this 
system increased from 960 in 1919 to 
119,638 in 1922. The statistics of the 
institutions for inebriates in Sweden, 
moreover, show an increase in three 
years in the number of persons in such 
institutions of more than 100 per cent. 

Under a law just passed in Sweden, 
the manufacture, sale, and importation 
of strong beer except that for export, 
scientific, medicinal, pharmaceutical, 
technical, and industrial purposes, is 
prohibited, as is also porter. This 
law goes into effect on October 1 , 1923. 


A measure providing for uniform 
local option throughout Denmark 
passed the Lower House of Parliament 
on December 20, 1919, by a vote of 62 
to 38, but the measure failed in the 
Upper House. A majority of all the 
electors in Denmark (a total of 622,000) 
by petition in 1918 requested the Gov¬ 
ernment to prohibit the manufacture 
of ale, maintain all war restrictions 
against alcoholic beverages, and to 
arrange for a plebiscite submitting the 
question of prohibition to the people. 
The law in effect at present leaves the 
question of granting or refusing li¬ 
censes in the hands of the local coun¬ 
cils, with provisions for advisory local 
option. Of the 302 local option elec¬ 
tions in parishes held during the past 
15 years, 250 parishes have voted for 
no license and 52 for license. One 
hundred eighty-one parishes are at 
present entirely under prohibition. 

The manufacture of alcoholic liquors 
in Latvia is a state monopoly, but the 
state grants the privilege to individ¬ 
uals and firms, to which the Govern¬ 
ment makes inducements in order to 
increase the sales and thus increase 
the revenue to the Government. A 
local option provision has been written 
in the statute books, but has not been 
used to any great extent in outlawing 
the liquor traffic. 

Esthonia was under prohibition 
during the period of the war. The 
war-time regulations were abolished, 
however, in 1920, and a system was 
established similar to the Bratt Sys¬ 
tem operating in Sweden. Under 
this system, which went into effect on 
June 30, 1920, no person is allowed 
more than one quart of whisky a 
month. Within a year and a half 
after this system replaced prohibi¬ 
tion, drunkenness increased 657 per 
cent, general cases of sickness in¬ 
creased 42 per cent, nerve sickness in¬ 
creased 71 per cent, and venereal dis- 


World-Wide Progress Toward Prohibition Legislation 


215 


eases increased 64 per cent. Provi¬ 
sion lias been made for the compulsory 
teaching of scientific temperance in the 
public schools of Esthonia. 

The Esthonian Government has 
issued a warning that all vessels carry¬ 
ing liquor cargoes must not stop 
in Esthonian waters. Spirituous and 
malt beverages cannot be taken into 
the country. 

Iceland voted to adopt national 
prohibition on September 10, 1908, the 
vote for prohibition being 4,645 and the 
vote against prohibition being 3,181. 
Under the terms of the provision upon 
which this vote was taken, the importa¬ 
tion of intoxicating liquors into Ice¬ 
land ceased on January 1,1912, and the 
legal sale of liquors within the country 
ceased on January 1, 1915. In 1922, 
as a result of the action of Spain, which 
threatened the destruction of the ex¬ 
port trade of Iceland so far as the fish 
production for the Spanish market was 
concerned, Iceland, very much against 
the will of the people and of the Gov¬ 
ernment, was compelled to suspend for 
one year her prohibition law, so far as 
that law excluded Spanish wines up to 
21 per cent of alcoholic strength. In 
the spring of 1923 this suspension was 
continued for a period as long as may 
be necessary for Iceland to free her¬ 
self from Spanish economic pressure. 
In the meantime, the government and 
trade interests of the Iceland fish 
industry are endeavoring to find other 
markets for that portion of the fish pro¬ 
duction which now goes to Spain, and 
indications are that new markets, 
opening in Great Britain and South 
America, are likely to furnish the relief 
which Iceland so greatly desires. 

In this connection it is of interest to 
note that Iceland’s original prohibition 
law did not affect Spain, because 
Iceland had not previously imported 
Spanish wines. Spain, in her effort to 
find markets to take the place of those 


lost to that country by the adoption of 
prohibition in the United States of 
America, has employed against de¬ 
fenceless Iceland as a weapon, and has 
performed an act, which, if permitted 
to go unchallenged by the great gov¬ 
ernments of the world, will eventually 
prove the destruction of the inter¬ 
nationally recognized principle of self- 
determination for small countries. 

The attitude of the Government and 
people of Iceland is shown by the fact 
that the prohibition law of the country 
still stands, in regard to all distilled 
liquors, all beer containing more than 
2} per cent of alcohol, which was the 
original alcoholic limit of Iceland’s 
prohibition law, and all wines of every 
kind, domestic and foreign, with the 
single exception of Spanish wines. The 
real sentiment in the Parliament of 
Iceland is furthermore shown in the 
resolution adopted by that body on 
May 11, 1923, at the final session of the 
Parliament, which is as follows: 

The Parliament does hereby declare 
that, although in this session, on account of 
trade treaties with Spain, an exception 
from the law regarding import of intoxi¬ 
cants has been legalized, this exception has 
been made because of demanding neces¬ 
sity, but not because the Parliament would 
depart from the law that was first passed on 
account of a general vote among the people. 

The question of the attitude of the 
Government will be an issue in the 
election of 30 members to the House 
of Representatives in Iceland, which 
will be held on October 27, 1923. 

Greenland is under prohibition and 
the law is well enforced. The sale of 
alcohol in shops and in restaurants has 
also been prohibited in the Faroe 
Islands. The law went into effect in 
those islands on January 1, 1918. 

Western and Middle Europe 

In December, 1920, the Dutch 
Parliament passed a law increasing the 


216 


The Annals of the American Academy 


internal revenue tax on spirits 150 per 
cent and on beer 100 per cent. This 
law went into effect on January 1, 
1921. In April, 1922, the Lower House 
of the Dutch Parliament passed by a 
vote of 39 to 29 a bill providing for 
local option for the sale of intoxicating 
liquors, except wines containing less 
than 22 per cent of alcohol and except 
other beverages containing less than 
15 per cent of alcohol. The temperance 
forces of Holland will press for a much 
better local option measure in the next 
session of Parliament. 

The bill providing for local option in 
the Netherlands was put into the 
Parliament of 1922 by ten members, of 
different political parties—three of the 
Protestant Christian party, three of the 
Catholic party, three of the Social 
Democrats, and one of the Liberal 
Democrats. 

At the close of the war, when the 
Belgian Government regained pos¬ 
session of Brussels, the Parliament 
passed a law providing for the prohibi¬ 
tion of the sale of intoxicating liquors 
in licensed places for consumption in 
barrooms. The efforts of the liquor 
interests in the general elections of 
1919 to elect candidates who would 
stand for the repeal of this law signally 
failed. 

The liquor law passed by the gov¬ 
ernment of Belgium on August 29, 
1919, prohibited the sale and con¬ 
sumption of spirits in all public places, 
and provided that spirits may be bought 
for private consumption in quantities of 
not less than two quarts at a purchase. 
The law furthermore greatly increased 
the tax on spirits and provided for the 
gradual reduction of the number of 
places where intoxicating liquors may 
be sold. Partly as a result of the 
operations of this law and partly as a 
result of conditions left by the war, the 
number of wine shops in Belgium has 
been reduced from about 250,000 in 


1913 to 141,000 in 1922. During the 
same period there has been a decrease 
of practically 50 per cent in the con¬ 
sumption of liquor. 

The official hour for closing liquor¬ 
selling establishments in Germany has 
been fixed at midnight, with a provision 
that only beer and certain non-alcoholic 
beverages are permitted to be sold after 
ten o’clock. The sale of alcoholic bev¬ 
erages to persons under the age of 20 
years is forbidden. 

The German Government has pro¬ 
posed severe restrictions in a new 
license measure. This bill, which was 
introduced in the Reichstag in June, 
1923, also provides for local option. 
Under the provisions of this bill a vote 
on the liquor question can be had in 
any community upon demand of one 
fifth of the qualified electors. The 
bill provides for two questions to ap¬ 
pear on the ballot, one dealing with 
whether the hotels and public houses 
shall still be authorized to supply in¬ 
toxicants and whether licenses should 
be renewed in cases where the owner¬ 
ship of licensed places changes, 
while the second presents the question 
as to whether the delivery of drinks 
should be allowed only in retail shops 
or by hotels and public houses, or 
whether such sale shall be prohibited 
altogether. A two-thirds vote would 
be required to change the condition in 
any community. 

In a law which went into effect in 
1921, innkeepers in Austria are prohib¬ 
ited from selling intoxicating liquors 
to persons under 18 years of age. 

Doctor Hainisch, the president of the 
Republic of Austria, is himself a total 
abstainer and an advocate of prohibi¬ 
tion. The greatest obstacle to some 
form of temperance legislation in 
Austria at the present time is the 
threatened opposition to such legis¬ 
lation by the great wine-producing 
countries of Europe. Especially is 


World-Wide Progress Toward Prohibition Legislation 


217 


this true in regard to France and Italy, 
which countries have loaned large sums 
of money to Austria and have cooper¬ 
ated through the medium of the League 
of Nations to assist the Austrian Gov¬ 
ernment in the reconstruction period 
through which that country has been 
passing. The very great increase in 
the retail price of alcoholic liquors has, 
however, resulted in a decided reduc¬ 
tion in consumption. 

On June 3, 1923, the people of 
Switzerland by a popular referendum 
defeated the proposed constitutional 
amendment by which federal control 
and taxation were to be extended to the 
production and sale of alcoholic bever¬ 
ages. The vote stood 258,000 for, and 
357,000 against, federal control and 
taxation. 

The alcohol monopoly in Switzer¬ 
land, which was adopted in 1885, has 
to do only with alcohol distilled from 
potatoes and corn, and has never had 
to do with alcohol distilled from 
fruits. Consequently, while grain dis¬ 
tillation has been in the hands of the 
government of Switzerland, the dis¬ 
tillation of liquors from fruits has been 
free. The effort of the Government, 
therefore, in this recent election was to 
extend the monopoly to spirits made 
from apples, pears, and other fruits. 

The temperance forces of Switzer¬ 
land are planning for an election under 
the initiative, on the question of local 
option as applied to all distilled liquors. 
This question will probably be sub¬ 
mitted to a vote of the people in 
1924. 

The National Assembly of Czecho¬ 
slovakia has passed a law limiting the 
consumption of liquor for the year 
1923 to 500,000 hectoliters and prohib¬ 
iting the importation of alcoholic 
liquors from foreign countries. The 
law also prohibits the sale of spirits to 
persons under 18 and the sale of beer 
to persons under 16. It also prohibits 


the sale or serving of any and all 
persons attending balls or dances. 

The Constitution of the Republic of 
Czechoslovakia contains a clause pro¬ 
hibiting the sale or serving of alcoholic 
liquors on election days or the day 
before an election. The prohibition 
of the sale of distilled liquors was 
adopted in that portion of Czechoslo¬ 
vakia known as Slovakia, the law going 
into effect on January 1, 1919. This 
law, however, has been difficult of en¬ 
forcement, largely due to the illiteracy 
of the peasants and the lack of knowl¬ 
edge concerning the nature and effect 
of alcohol. 

The Minister of Public Instruction in 
Poland, in the summer of 1923, in a 
public circular addressed to the pro¬ 
vincial school boards, directs the atten¬ 
tion of the school authorities to the 
evils threatened by the use of alco¬ 
hol, especially spirits, among school 
children, and urges immediate action 
against alcoholism in the schools. 

The law adopted in Poland on April 
23, 1920, which went into effect on 
January 1 , 1921, provides for local 
option for every village, town and city 
in the Republic. Local option elections 
are called by the petition of one tenth 
of the population, and the question of 
license or no license at such elections is 
decided by a majority vote. Elections 
cannot be held more frequently than 
every three years, but at any time 
after three years has expired a new 
election can be called. Under the 
provisions of this law, moreover, 
counties have the right to adopt prohi¬ 
bition by a two-thirds vote. Where 
saloons are permitted, they are limited 
to one for every 2,500 of the population. 
The law forbids the sale of alcoholic 
liquors to persons under 18 years of age, 
prohibits sales on credit, prohibits the 
sale of any liquors containing more than 
45 per cent of alcohol, and prohibits the 
sale of liquors on railroads, at railroad 


218 


The Annals of the American Academy 


stations, at army camps, barracks, and 
sporting places. This law also pro¬ 
vides for the closing of saloons on Sun¬ 
days and holidays. Under its pro¬ 
visions, every saloon must be closed at 
3 o’clock in the afternoon before Sun¬ 
days and holidays, and remain closed 
until 10 o’clock in the forenoon after 
any Sunday or holiday. 

The Minister of the Treasury of 
Poland recently requested the Parlia¬ 
ment to amend the law adopted in 
1920, by a provision which in reality 
would practically repeal it. This 
action of the Minister of the Treasury 
has greatly aroused the people and a 
strong agitational campaign is being 
conducted throughout the country 
against any weakening of the anti¬ 
liquor laws. 

The Prime Minister of Italy, Signor 
Mussolini, has approved the decision 
of hotel keepers and restaurant pro¬ 
prietors at Tivoli, near Rome, to close 
their places of business on Sunday for 
the purpose of cooperating in the 
campaign against alcoholism. Signor 
Mussolini in this connection made the 
following statement: “Wine and spirit 
drinking must no longer corrupt and 
debauch the Italian race—excess of 
drinking, that is.” 

Prom the beginning of the war to the 
present time, 17,094 places for the sale 
of intoxicating liquors have been closed 
in Italy. There still remains, how¬ 
ever, one drink shop to every 150 of 
the population. 

A royal decree published early in the 
year 1920 prohibited during the year 
all importation into Greece of alcohol 
spirits, wine, and all drinks containing 
alcohol, except those imported in bot¬ 
tles. 

The Constitution of the new Repub¬ 
lic of Jugo-Slavia includes a clause 
pledging the state to fight against the 
misuse of alcoholic liquors. Under 
the direction of the Social Hygiene 


Section of the Ministry of Health, 
a bill providing for the limiting of the 
evils of the liquor traffic has been pre¬ 
pared and will be presented to Parlia¬ 
ment at an early date. 

By order of the Minister of Educa¬ 
tion, all the public schools of Bulgaria 
gave over the morning of January 18, 
1923, to the consideration of scientific 
temperance and to listening to lectures 
by leading doctors on the ill effects of 
alcohol. 

According to the best information 
available, nation-wide prohibition went 
into effect in the Turkish Empire on 
June 15, 1923. Much of this em¬ 
pire had been under prohibition prior 
to the going into effect of the national 
prohibitory law, but the national law 
which has just gone into effect closed 
2,478 drinking places. The law pro¬ 
vides heavy penalties for violations. 
Practically all the drinking places were 
in the cities. The rural districts have, 
in the main, been free of liquor selling 
establishments. 

While it is very difficult to get 
definite and reliable information 
from Russia, sufficient information has 
leaked through to indicate that the 
prohibition of the beverage liquor 
traffic in Russia during the period 
since the World War has been an im¬ 
portant factor in the effort to cope 
with famine, disease and crime. Pro¬ 
hibition in Russia under the Czar and 
also under the Soviet Government has 
applied to all strong liquors, but has 
not applied to the production and con¬ 
sumption of light wines in the southern 
wine-producing districts. So far as 
light wines are concerned, their sale 
has been subject to local veto. A 
significant fact is that the trade trea¬ 
ties which have been made by Russia 
under Soviet rule have contained 
clauses recognizing the right of Russia 
to exclude the importation of in¬ 
toxicating liquors into Soviet Russia. 



World-Wide Progress Toward Prohibition Legislation 


Reports now indicate that Soviet Rus¬ 
sia lias reinstated certain phases of the 
vodka monopoly as a revenue-pro¬ 
ducing measure. 

Africa 

Under the agreement of the Con¬ 
vention of the League of Nations re¬ 
lating to the liquor traffic, the impor¬ 
tation, distribution, sale and possession 
of trade spirits of every kind and of 
beverages mixed with these spirits, 
are prohibited in Africa, the only 
territory exempt from this prohibition 
being Algiers, Tunis, Morocco, Libya, 
Egypt and the Union of South Africa. 
The local governments concerned, how¬ 
ever, have the privilege of deciding 
what distilled beverages in their ter¬ 
ritory shall fall under the category of 
trade spirits. 

A movement is on foot to introduce 
in the new Egyptian Parliament a bill 
to prohibit the importation and sale 
of intoxicating liquors. A delegation 
of very influential men recently waited 
upon H. E. Yehia Ibrahim Pasha, the 
Prime Minister of Egypt, who gave 
assurances that the Government would 
certainly take some steps to stop the 
spread of the liquor traffic in Egypt. 
The Ministry of the Interior has also 
issued a circular to the departments 
concerned, directing that on no ac¬ 
count should any new license for the 
sale of intoxicating liquors be issued. 

The movement for prohibition legis¬ 
lation in Egypt is headed by Prince 
Omar Tousson, who is universally con¬ 
ceded to be the ablest prince in Egypt, 
highly educated, holding a very high 
standard of morals, and regarded as 
the wealthiest man in the Kingdom. 
Prince Tousson, moreover, has the full 
confidence of the king and of prac¬ 
tically all the Pashas. He is also pop¬ 
ular with the best element of the 
English-speaking classes. Prince Mo¬ 
hammed Ali, a brother of the Ex- 


Khedive, Abbas, is another very prom¬ 
inent prince who can be depended up¬ 
on to lead in the fight for Egyptian 
prohibitory legislation. 

In this connection it is interesting 
and significant to note that the Amer¬ 
ican Minister to Egypt, the Honorable 
J. Morton Howell, has through public 
addresses, correspondence and personal 
com ersation, succeeded in impressing 
the officials of the Kingdom of Egypt 
and the leading personalities in that 
Kingdom with regard to the success of, 
and beneficial results of, prohibition 
in the United States. In a recent 
conversation with one of the leading 
princes of Egypt, in which the proposed 
prohibition legislation for that King¬ 
dom was discussed, the American 
Minister made the following state¬ 
ment, which was afterwards given to 
the public: 

Your Highness, I have no disposition to 
enter into any contest with reference to any 
measure or law which you Egyptians may 
want, or not want, but I can say to you 
that this movement is most gratifying to 
me and to my people, and I think it will 
dearly tend to show that your Govern¬ 
ment and your people are keenly alert and 
progressive in the interest of the very best 
things for your Kingdom. It matters not 
what those who are opposed to prohibition 
may say with respect to the United States. 

I want to say to you that prohibition in the 
United States is a success, and there are but 
few people who would argue otherwise, ex¬ 
cept those who are anarchistically inclined 
and who willingly violate the Constitution 
of the country which is giving them their 
protection, and sustaining them in all their 
legal rights. I cannot, therefore, but hope 
that this movement, which has been set in 
motion by this Prince of the realm, may 
come to a successful fruition. 

The French administration in French 
West Africa by a decree dated De¬ 
cember 24, 1921, introduced prohi¬ 
bition into that territory. The taxes 
on alcohol were very high before 1920. 


220 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Since that time they have been tripled 
and even quadrupled. It is under¬ 
stood that the prohibition which the 
French have introduced will be ex¬ 
tended to Togo, if that has not already 
been accomplished. 

A local option bill was introduced in 
the Parliament of the Union of South 
Africa on February 21, 1922. This 
bill was introduced on petition of 
86,000 persons in South Africa. It 
was finally defeated by the narrow 
margin of seven votes. A similar 
measure will be resubmitted in the new 
session of Parliament in January, 1924. 
The liquor interests, including the wine 
farmers, are strongly organizing against 
the local option bill which, in their 
opinion, paves the way to prohibition. 

The proclamation recently issued 
by the High Commissioner of South 
Africa prohibits the importation of 
spirituous liquors into Swaziland, ex¬ 
cept w ith the wnritten permission of the 
Resident Commissioner. 

Asia 

The first prohibition law directed 
against the sale and consumption of 
intoxicating liquors in Japan wtis 
adopted by the Japanese Parliament 
in the spring of 1922. This law pro¬ 
hibits the sale of intoxicating liquor to 
persons under 20 years of age, and pro¬ 
hibits the use of alcoholic beverages by 
all such minors. The final adoption of 
this legislation w r as due in large degree 
to the persistent efforts of Mr. Sho 
Nemoto, who has been a member of 
the Low 7 er House of the Japanese Par¬ 
liament since 1899. For almost a 
quarter of a century, Mr. Nemoto 
submitted this bill each year to the 
Imperial Diet. It w r as finally passed 
through that body in 1908 and has been 
passed by that body at each succeeding 
session until at last in 1922 it w r as also 
passed by the House of Peers and be¬ 
came a law on March 29, 1922. Mr. 


Nemoto was educated in the United 
States of America and was so inspired 
by the temperance lectures of Frances 
E. Willard, while he was in the United 
States, that he went back to Japan 
determined to labor as long as it might 
be necessary for the securing of tem¬ 
perance legislation through the Jap¬ 
anese Government. While Mr. Ne¬ 
moto himself is a Christian, it is an 
interesting fact to note that most of 
those who took the leading part in the 
debates and efforts to secure the pas¬ 
sage of this bill through both Houses 
of the Japanese Parliament were non- 
Christians. 

During the year 1922 almost every 
Provincial Legislative Council in India 
brought forward some measure pro¬ 
viding for the restriction of the liquor 
traffic and looking toward eventual 
prohibition. The Punjab passed a 
local option law which became effec¬ 
tive on April 1, 1922. The state of 
Nepal, with a population of five mil¬ 
lion people, mostly Hindus, has been 
under prohibition since 1920. This 
prohibition was made permanent by 
official action in 1922. The state of 
Hyderabad has adopted prohibition, 
but the law 7 is not so stringent as it is in 
some of the other states. The Mos¬ 
lem state of Bhopal, which is the only 
state in India ruled by a woman, 
adopted prohibition for the entire 
state in February, 1923. Bhopal has 
a population of over one million. The 
state ranks next to Hyderabad among 
the Mohammedan states in India. 
The throne has descended in the female 
line since 1844. 

There are quite a number of native 
states that have put prohibition into 
effect through the decrees of the native 
rulers, during the past three years. 

Australia and Oceania 

The state of Queensland is to vote on 
prohibition in October, 1923. Under 


World-Wide Progress Toward Prohibition Legislation 


221 


the provisions of the Liquor Amend¬ 
ment Act passed in 1920, a triennial 
state poll is provided for. Three 
issues are presented on the ballot: 
namely, state control, state prohibition, 
and continuance. Provision is made, 
moreover, for expressing a second 
preference. If, as a result of an 
election, no one of the three issues has 
a majority of all votes polled, the issue 
having the lowest number of first pref¬ 
erence votes is dropped and the second 
preference votes for that issue dis¬ 
tributed to the other two issues. On 
this basis, the first poll taken under the 
law in 1920 resulted in 155,669 votes 
for prohibition and 193,761 votes 
for continuance. Should prohibition 
carry in the October, 1923, election it 
would go into effect on July 1, 1925. 
The sale of liquor to persons under 21 
years of age, or to any woman in a bar, 
is prohibited in Queensland. 

The first election under the prohibi¬ 
tion referendum law of Victoria was 
taken on October 21,1920, and resulted 
in 278,707 votes for continuance, 
36,025 votes for reduction, and 212,254 
votes for no license. Under the pro¬ 
visions of the law passed by the last 
Legislature of Victoria, no additional 
poll is provided for until 1930. After 
that, a state-wide poll cannot be taken 
more frequently than once every eight 
years. Permanent six o’clock closing 
of liquor selling establishments went 
into effect on February 2, 1920. 

The Liquor Amendment Act adopted 
by the Parliament of New South Wales 
in 1919 suspended the old local option 
provisions for three years, that being 
the time that the reduction board would 
operate under the provisions of the law. 
If, after the next general election at 
which the question is considered, pro¬ 
hibition is not carried for the entire 
state, local option polls may again be 
taken. The new law provides that no 
new licenses are to be granted in any 


part of the state unless by petition 
signed by a majority of the residents 
living within a radius of one mile. 

The West Australian law, passed in 
1922, repeals the local option section of 
the former law, creates a licenses re¬ 
duction board with provisions for cash 
compensation and provides for a poll on 
prohibition to be taken on some day 
other than the general election day, 
with a provision that the poll shall not 
be taken more frequently than every 
five years and that a three-fifths major¬ 
ity shall be required for prohibition. 

New Zealand voted on the question 
of prohibition in December, 1922. 
This w r as a three-cornered contest, 
voters being privileged to vote for one 
of three provisions: namely, contin¬ 
uance, state control, and prohibition. 
The result of the election showed 
282,669 votes for continuance, 35,727 
votes for state control, and 300,791 
votes for prohibition. While absolute 
prohibition received the largest vote, 
it failed to carry because of the require¬ 
ment calling for a majority of all votes 
cast at the election in order to carry 
prohibition or state control. The 
poll, however, showed that 20,000 
more votes had been cast for prohibi¬ 
tion than had ever before been cast for 
that policy in any previous election. 

The Scilly Isles are all under prohibi¬ 
tion, which was adopted during the 
World War and has been continued. 
Governor W. W. Gilmore of Guam 
issued a proclamation in 1920 prohib¬ 
iting the use of “tuba” (a native 
national intoxicating drink) under 
penalty of a fine not to exceed $100, or 
imprisonment for 90 days, or both. 

The law passed in 1921 prohibits the 
manufacture of intoxicating liquors in 
Samoa and also prohibits importation 
of intoxicating liquors except for 
medicinal, sacramental or industrial 
purposes. The sale or the offering for 
sale of intoxicating liquors is prohibited. 


222 


The of Annals the American Academy 


The importation of liquors required for 
hospitals and for medical purposes 
from time to time is entirely in the 
hands of the Government, but no 
liquors under the law can be sold for 
any but medicinal, sacramental or 
industrial purposes. 

The intoxicating liquor laws of Cook 
Islands were amended and strengthened 
in 1921. Under the old law passed in 
1915 the same general conditions 
prevailed as in the case of Samoa, 
except that the Resident Commissioner 
was empowered to import liquor and 
sell to any person who was not a native. 
Under the amended law passed in 1921, 
no such liquors can be sold or imported, 
except for medicinal, sacramental or 
industrial purposes. 

Since 1920 the liquor bars of the 
Fiji Islands have been closed on Sun¬ 
day. Europeans in the Islands are 
practically unanimous in regard to 
prohibition of alcoholic liquors so far as 
the natives are concerned, but there is 
a strong fight being waged among 
Europeans on the question of prohibi¬ 
tion that would include Europeans as 
well as natives. 

National Self-Determination 

The adoption of prohibition as a 
national legislative policy in a number 
of small nations, along with the ag¬ 
gressive foreign commercial policy of 
wine-producing countries, opens the 
way for international misunderstand¬ 
ings that may prove far more seri¬ 
ous than surface conditions indicate. 
Certain it is that the very important 
international question as to how far 
any nation may justifiably go in bring¬ 
ing economic pressure to compel an¬ 
other country to regulate its domestic 
affairs to conform to the desire of the 
country responsible for such pressure, 
must be settled. It is apparent, of 
course, that unless some limit is to be 
recognized by international custom or 


d 


international law, the principle of self- 
determination for small countries at 
least will become entirely imaginary. 
In this modern age, economic pressure, 
under certain conditions, may be quite 
as effective as military pressure. 

The economic pressure brought to 
bear by Spain to compel the modifica¬ 
tion of the prohibition law in Iceland, 
against the will of the people and the 
Government of that island country, 
which is so dependent upon Spanish 
markets, left no alternative to the 
Government of Iceland. The same 
thing is true of the economic pressure 
brought to bear by France, Spain and 
Portugal on Norway. Moreover, if 
France, Spain and Portugal are per¬ 
mitted thus to regulate the domestic 
affairs of Iceland and Norway, without 
even a protest from nations like the 
United States of America and the 
British Empire, Finland, or any other 
small country that adopts prohibition 
as a national policy, will undoubtedly 
be compelled to face the same economic 
pressure from the wine-producing 
countries of southern and southwestern 
Europe. 

International Aspect of Domestic 
Enforcement 

The situation in the United States of 
America, moreover, presents another 
problem new in the international field. 
After three years of experience, the 
American Government faces the sig¬ 
nificant fact that the enforcement of 
prohibition within the borders of the 
United States presents in many respects 
what may very easily become serious 
international problems. The inter¬ 
national boundary line surrounding the 
United States of America is more than 
17,500 miles in length. Thirty-two of 
the forty-eight states of the Union are 
located on this international boundary 
line. Hundreds of thousands of high- 
powered automobiles capable of op- 



223 


World-Wide Progress Toward Prohibition Legislation 


erating along the land portion of 
this international boundary, fleets of 
vessels stored with liquors flying the 
flags of other nations and operating 
just outside the three-mile limit, dis¬ 
puted questions as to the rights and 
privileges properly due the thousands 
of foreign vessels docking at American 
ports, and the use of airplanes for in¬ 
ternational liquor smuggling, indicate 
something of enforcement conditions 
under national prohibition in the 
United States of America that can be 
settled properly and fully only through 
some form of international coopera¬ 
tion. 

Effect Abroad of American Policy 

There is no question but that the 
future policy of the United States 
Government, in the matter of prohi¬ 
bition, is likely profoundly to influence 
the progress of prohibition legislation 
in other countries of the world. 

The question as to whether prohibi¬ 
tion in the United States, therefore, is 
to be permanent, is apropos. No 
amendment to the federal Constitution 
ever received as strong official sanction 
by the states as the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment. The original Constitution w r as 
adopted in the 13 original states by a 
majority of about two to one. The 
aggregate vote in the state Senates and 
state Houses of Representatives on the 
Eighteenth Amendment shows a major¬ 
ity of more than four to one. 

The Bill of Rights, containing the 
first ten Amendments to the Ameri¬ 
can Constitution, and the Eleventh 
Amendment, were ratified by 10 out of 
13 states. Four states did not ratify 
the Twelfth Amendment. Five states 
did not ratify the Thirteenth Amend¬ 
ment. Four states did not ratify the 
Fourteenth Amendment. Six states 
failed to ratify the Fifteenth Amend¬ 
ment. Six states failed to ratify the 
Sixteenth Amendment. Twelve states 


did not ratify the Seventeenth Amend¬ 
ment, and 12 states did not ratify the 
Nineteenth Amendment. The Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment, however, received 
the ratification of 46 out of 48 states, 
and one House in each of the two 
remaining states voted for ratifica¬ 
tion. 

Moreover, 47 of the 48 states enacted 
laws to help carry into effect the pro¬ 
visions of the Eighteenth Amendment, 
and but one of the 47 has repealed or 
weakened such laws. 

Is American Prohibition 
Permanent? 

Since the adoption of national pro¬ 
hibition, and in fact for several years 
before national prohibition w 7 ent into 
effect, every state election held on the 
question of repealing or modifying or 
weakening state or national prohibition 
resulted in a larger majority for con¬ 
tinued prohibition than had been 
recorded in previous elections. 

So long as more than one third of 
either House of Congress stands firm, 
the Eighteenth Amendment can be 
neither modified nor repealed. And if 
the time should ever come when tw 7 o 
thirds of each House of Congress should 
vote to submit the question of modifi¬ 
cation or repeal, a majority vote in a 
single House of each of thirteen state 
legislatures would make such proposed 
modification or repeal impossible. 
Moreover, wdiile only a majority vote is 
required to change the federal enforce¬ 
ment code, if every member of the 
national House of Representatives who 
represents a normally “wet” district and 
every Senator who represents a normal¬ 
ly “wet” state, were to combine efforts 
in Congress, they could not control 
35 per cent in either House of Congress. 
In order to modify or amend the en¬ 
forcement code, therefore, it would be 
necessary to secure the votes of those 
in both Houses of Congress who repre- 


224 


The Annals of the American Academy 


sent districts or states that are under 
prohibition by state law as well as by 
federal law. 

Prospects for World Prohibition 

Local option laws which have been 
adopted in many countries during 
recent years and present prospects for 
the adoption of local option pro¬ 
visions in many other important coun¬ 
tries, indicate progress toward prohi¬ 
bition throughout the world. Experi¬ 
ence in the United States of America 
and elsewhere has demonstrated that 
local option is in reality but a stepping 
stone toward prohibition. 

Recent remarkable developments, 
moreover, in transportation and com¬ 
munication will, of necessity, compel 
rapid progress of restrictive national 
and international provisions to safe¬ 
guard the integrity and rights of nations 
large and small, if prohibition, through 
local option or other restrictive legis¬ 
lation, comes rapidly to be adopted as 
a national policy in a number of im¬ 
portant countries. The railroad, the 
steamship, the automobile and the 
airship, along with the telegraph, 
telephone, ocean cable and wireless, 
have in recent years made of the world 
a great neighborhood of nations, de¬ 


manding international protection for 
national policies and national laws. 

Modern national and international 
success in matters of health, sanita¬ 
tion, international travel, international 
banking, international commerce, and 
in international moral and religious 
movements, are rapidly paving the 
way for international prohibitory leg¬ 
islation, provided that the experiment 
in the United States of America proves 
successful. 

Twenty-five years ago, approxi¬ 
mately 17 per cent of the land area and 
16 per cent of the population of this 
nation were under state-wide prohibi¬ 
tion. Today, approximately the same 
proportion of the land area and the pop¬ 
ulation of the world are under national 
prohibition. If it has been possible, 
during the last twenty-five years, with¬ 
out chart or compass, for the policy of 
prohibition to become a great national 
constitutional provision in America, is 
it unreasonable to believe, assuming a 
successful experiment in America, that, 
with the example and experience of one 
of the greatest nations of the world to 
indicate the value and tendency of pro¬ 
hibition, such a policy, world-wide in its 
scope, may become a reality within the 
next quarter of a century? 


Prohibition in Canada 

By Cyril D. Boyce 

Moderation League of Ontario, Canada 


Rise of Prohibition 

ANADA, like the United States, 
has had a troubled and com¬ 
plicated history in the matter of pro¬ 
hibition. 

Without going into earlier attempts 
to achieve prohibition, we may begin 
with the Canada Temperance Act, 
usually known as the Scott Act, which 
is the legislative foundation of Cana¬ 
dian prohibition. 

The Scott Act (which has since been 
amended more than once) is a local 
option on a big scale. It provided 
that, on a petition signed by 25 per 
cent of the electors of any county or 
city, a vote should be taken to deter¬ 
mine whether prohibition should be 
enforced, and a bare majority sufficed. 
If there was a majority for enforce¬ 
ment, prohibition was enacted for 
three years. The prohibition ex¬ 
tended to the sale of any intoxicating 
liquor, except the sale of wine for 
exclusively sacramental purposes by 
druggists and specially licensed vend¬ 
ors, and the sale for exclusively medi¬ 
cal purposes, on a certificate of a medi¬ 
cal man, or for bona fide use in some 
art, trade or manufacture, on a certifi¬ 
cate of Justice of the Peace. 

The penalty for selling liquor con¬ 
trary to the law was a fine of not less 
than $50, or imprisonment for one 
month, with or without hard labor, 
for the first offense, and double these 
penalties for the second offense; for a 
third or a subsequent offense, the 
penalty was imprisonment for a term 
of not exceeding four months, with or 
without hard labor, without the option 
of a fine. 


A physician who gave a certificate 
for liquor other than for strictly medi¬ 
cal purposes was liable to a penalty of 
$20 for the first offense and a double 
penalty for subsequent offenses. 

Some parts of the country—Prince 
Edward Island particularly—voted 
themselves into the Act almost imme¬ 
diately after its passage, and counties 
in New Brunswick, Ontario, Quebec, 
Nova Scotia and Manitoba followed 
suit at different dates. Thus, prior 
to the war and the recent prohibitory 
legislation, a severe form of local option 
was in force in a considerable number 
of places in the Dominion—though the 
observance of the law seems to have 
left much to be desired. 

An eminent local observer of its 
working, Professor Goldwin Smith, 
described the chief result of the Act as 

the substitution of an unlicensed and un¬ 
regulated for a licensed trade. The de¬ 
mand for drink remained the same, but it 
was supplied in illicit ways. It was found 
by those who were engaged in the cam¬ 
paign against the Scott Act that the lowest 
class of liquor dealers were far from zealous 
in their opposition to prohibitive legislation. 
They foresaw that the result to them 
would be simply a sale for liquor without 
the license fee. Drunkenness, instead of 
having diminished, appears to have in¬ 
creased. 

The evil results of- the Act were also 
exemplified by a memorial signed by 
300 citizens of the town of Wood- 
stock, which declared that: 

The Scott Act in this town has not di¬ 
minished but increased drunkenness; it 
has almost wholly prevented the use of 
lager beer, which was becoming an article 
of common consumption; it has operated 



16 


225 


226 The Annals of the 

to discourage the use of light beverages, 
substituting therefor in a large measure 
ardent spirits; and it has led to the opening 
of many drinking places which did not 
exist under the license laws, and to the 
sale of liquor being continued until hours % 
after midnight. 

National Prohibition: Abortive 
Effort 

The apostles of teetotalism were not 
content that districts which wanted 
compulsory teetotalism should be able 
to enforce it. They also desired to 
thrust it upon districts which had not 
availed themselves of or had aban¬ 
doned the Canada Temperance Act. 
In 1898 an effort was made to get 
prohibition enforced throughout the 
Dominion, and an Act was passed 
providing for a general plebiscite on 
the question. A vote was taken 
under the Act which resulted in 278,- 
380 votes being cast for, and 264,693 
votes against it—a majority for pro¬ 
hibition of 13,687. The Government 
and the Dominion Parliament decided 
that the majority was not large enough 
to warrant them passing a prohibitory 
law. Seeing that the population of the 
Dominion was at that time about 5| 
millions, a total vote of half a million 
was not regarded as an adequate ex¬ 
pression of opinion. It was an in¬ 
stance of the old story of only a minor¬ 
ity troubling to vote on this question. 
The oldest province, Quebec, found 
only 28,436 persons to vote for pro¬ 
hibition, as against four times that 
number on the other side, and it 
clearly would have been most unjusti¬ 
fied, even according to democratic 
standards, if a prohibitory law had 
been enacted. 

At this time there was a long- 
drawn-out constitutional dispute as to 
whether prohibitory legislation was 
under federal or provincial control. 
It was not that the provincial govern- 


American Academy 

ments wanted it under their control; 
they rather desired to escape from it, 
and the Dominion Government was 
equally desirous of escaping the odium 
of forcing prohibition upon provinces 
which did not want it. 

Provincial Prohibition 

The matter in 1901 was decided by 
the Privy Council on an appeal regard¬ 
ing a prohibition law passed in Mani¬ 
toba. It was decided that the province 
had complete control over the retail 
trade in liquor, and the Dominion over 
manufacture and importation. The 
Manitoba Prohibition Law, though 
declared constitutional and valid, did 
not, however, come into force. It had 
been suspended pending the Privy 
Council appeal, and remained sus¬ 
pended afterwards; but, in the years 
preceding the war, about one half of 
the province was under local option and 
the other half under license. 

About this time local option under 
the Scott Act, which a few years pre¬ 
viously had had a setback, was again, 
under the stimulus of agitation, 
spreading, particularly in rural dis¬ 
tricts, and in thq first decade of the 
present century the great majority of 
the rural districts in Eastern Canada 
had come under local option. 

In 1907 Prince Edward Island 
passed a Prohibition Act, but in 1917 
it had to pass another to make better 
provision for enforcing the law. 

In 1910 the Nova Scotia Temperance 
Act was passed; it enforced prohibition 
over the whole of that province except 
the city of Halifax, and that city went 
“dry” in 1916. 

Manitoba adopted prohibition in 
June, 1916, by nearly a two to one 
majority. 

British Columbia passed a Prohi¬ 
bition Act in 1916, to come into force 
in July, 1917, if approved by a referen¬ 
dum. On the referendum it was 


Prohibition in Canada 


227 


approved, in spite of an adverse vote 
of the soldiers then overseas. 

In Alberta a Prohibition Act was 
passed in 1914, and approved by a 
popular vote in 1915 by 58,295 to 
37,509. This was followed by another 
Act, which came into operation in 
July, 1916. 

New Brunswick passed a prohibition 
law, which went into force in May, 
1917, and was confirmed by plebiscite 
in 1920. 

Ontario passed a law bringing pro¬ 
hibition into force in September, 1916, 
subject to a referendum to be held 
after the war, to determine whether 
the statute should be permanent. The 
result of this referendum, taken at the 
end of 1919, was a vote for permanence 
of 772,041, against 365,365. 

Quebec had war-time prohibition, 
but, by a nine to one vote on a referen¬ 
dum afterwards, returned to the sale 
of beer and wine under license, with 
sale of spirits under Government con¬ 
trol. 

Saskatchewan had a “dispensary” 
system—that is, a system of Govern¬ 
ment-owned liquor shops, or dis¬ 
pensaries, which was followed in 
December, 1916, by prohibition. A 
provincial regulation prohibited the 
transport of liquor for export by motor 
vehicles, but the Saskatchewan Court 
of Appeal has declared that regulation 
to be unconstitutional and void. 

Newfoundland has been completely 
prohibitionist since the beginning of 
1917. 

It should be noted that the various 
Provincial Acts, which were all on the 
model of the earliest act—that of 
Manitoba—did not entirely stop the 
consumption of liquor. They did not 
prohibit manufacture in one province 
for export into another. That could 
only be done by the Dominion; and it 
was done by an Order in Council by 
the federal Government in March, 


1918, prohibiting importation into any 
province which had adopted prohibi¬ 
tion, as well as the manufacture of 
alcoholic liquors therein. 

An attempt was made in 1919 to 
incorporate the provisions of the 
Order (which was only a temporary 
measure) in an Act of Parliament, but, 
owing to a stubborn difference of 
opinion between the Senate and the 
House of Commons, the bill was 
dropped. 

Prohibition at Work 

In substitution therefor the Domin¬ 
ion Parliament passed an Act under 
which a provincial legislature can, by 
resolution, request the Governor-in- 
Council to take a vote of the people 
of the province upon the question of 
the importation of liquor. If the 
majority favor such prohibition, the 
Dominion Government may proclaim, 
by Order in Council, such prohibition 
to be in force. 

Even under the bone-dry legislation, 
liquor comes steadily into Ontario 
and into the other provinces. It is 
transported in coffins, in dry goods 
boxes, in oil cans, as cheese or butter, 
and in many other disguises. Freight 
cars are detached at rural stations 
and unloaded. The traffic by motor 
is continuous and considerable. 
Practically all this liquor is con¬ 
signed to private persons, and even 
with whisky at $40 a case many orders 
in defiance of the law are secured by 
the illicit traders. There is no doubt 
that in the towns and cities of Ontario 
the hotels with few exceptions have 
observed the law, while in the clubs no 
liquor has been served. 

In New Brunswick it has not been 
difficult to obtain liquor, although 
there, as in the other Atlantic prov¬ 
inces, there is little public drinking. 
In the West apparently prohibition 
has not worked as effectively as was 


228 


The Annals of the American Academy 


desired. During the war there was 
general observance of the law, but 
since there has been more relaxation 
and evasion. It was bluntly declared 
in the Alberta Legislature that 80 or 
90 per cent of the men of the province 
treated the law with neglect and con¬ 
tempt. That there is general evasion 
of its provisions is freely admitted. 
For this reason chiefly, the United 
Farmers of the province have de¬ 
clared for a “bone-dry” regulation, 
making it illegal to keep liquor even 
in private houses. 

In Saskatchewan there is a move¬ 
ment to reestablish the system of the 
sale of liquor by agents of the Govern¬ 
ment, which prohibition superseded. 
The Men’s Brotherhood of St. Mary’s 
Anglican Church at Regina has de¬ 
clared by resolution for the dispensary 
system for the reasons that, as alleged, 
the effects of prohibition are “very 
demoralizing” since public opinion 
was not in favor of the law in its ex¬ 
treme form, that evasion is openly 
tolerated, and that without the help 
of the public, the police are helpless to 
compel observance of the prohibitory 
enactment. There is at present a 
large public demand for beer, wine and 
spirituous liquors by Government con¬ 
trol, similar to that now in form in 
Quebec. 

Present Position in Canada 

The present position of the various 
provinces may therefore be stated as 
follows: During 1920 and the early 
months of 1921, seven of the nine 
provinces decided by referenda to pro¬ 
hibit private importations. On July 
10, 1920, the electors of New Bruns¬ 
wick voted by a majority of about two 
to one for total prohibition. The 
electors of British Columbia, on Octo¬ 
ber 20, 1920, voted by a large ma¬ 
jority in favor of the enactment of 
legislation, providing for Government 


control and sale in sealed packages of 
spirituous and malted liquors, rejecting 
the previous policy of prohibition. 
This Act, which was brought forward 
by the Moderation League, has been a 
great success both morally and finan¬ 
cially. There is, at the present time, 
agitation to allow saU of beer and wine 
with meals in hotels. 

On the other hand, plebiscites held 
on October 25, 1920, in the three 
Prairie Provinces and in Nova Scotia, 
resulted in large majorities for pro¬ 
hibition of importations. This ex¬ 
ample was followed by Ontario, which 
in a plebiscite held on April 18, 1921, 
voted for a policy of complete prohibi¬ 
tion by prohibiting private importa¬ 
tions. The provincial government of 
Quebec has established a regime of 
governmental control of the sale of 
liquor which went into effect on May 
1, 1921. Profits are devoted to edu¬ 
cation, charity, good roads and for the 
redemption of the provincial debt. 
Beer and wine licenses are allowed, 
with adequate restrictions and the 
sale, by Government stores only, of 
spirituous liquors. There accrues to 
the province of Quebec five million 
dollars profit on this system. Crime 
and drunkenness is much less in “wet” 
Quebec than in “dry” Ontario. 

On June 22 of this year, Manitoba 
voted for the Moderation League Bill 
by over 40,000 majority. This over¬ 
whelming vote gives the people the 
right to purchase by individual license 
(fee $1 per annum) any liquor desired. 
Orders are given at a Government 
store, but delivery is to be made by the 
Liquor Commission to the residence 
of the purchaser. No liquor can be 
bought at the store and carried away 
by the purchaser. 

There are five branches of the Mod¬ 
eration League in Canada. These 
are in British Columbia, Alberta, 
Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario. 


Prohibition in Canada 


229 


They favor a system of Govern¬ 
ment control and they carry on aggres¬ 
sive movements for real temperance 
legislation. The League has been suc¬ 
cessful in repealing prohibition in 
British Columbia and in Manitoba. 
Alberta is voting on a referendum on 
November 5 of this year, and the 
Leagues expect a decisive victory. 
The Saskatchewan Moderation League 
is confident of overthrowing prohibi¬ 
tion within the next year. 

The Moderation League of Ontario 
has had the most difficult campaign of 
any of the other provincial Leagues. 


In 1919 prohibition was carried by 
411,000. In 1921 this was decreased 
by nearly 250,000, so Ontario is con¬ 
fident that a referendum vote on the 
Quebec system would carry at the 
present time. 

The situation regarding prohibition 
in Canada can be summed up in 
these few words: The pendulum for 
moderation and temperance is swing¬ 
ing against prohibition. All the signs 
bear out this contention and within 
two years the greater portion of the 
Dominion will be enjoying wise and 
sane liquor regulation. 



Prohibitory Legislation in Canada 

By B. H. Spence 

The Dominion Alliance for the Suppression of the Liquor Traffic 


I 

C ANADA has been a pioneer 
amongst the nations in regard to 
the prohibition reform. For years it 
was one of the most temperate coun¬ 
tries in the w r orld, as will be seen by 
the following table, which gives the per 
capita consumption of liquors in dif¬ 
ferent countries: 


by some novelty-seeking cranks. It is the 
inevitable result of great universal condi¬ 
tions and forces. Wherever you find an 
evil of any kind, something that curses and 
hurts humanity, and into contact with that 
evil you bring men and women of Christian 
character, unselfish thought, and earnest 
purpose, there you have the elements of a 
moral reform. That reform will spring 
from those conditions, and will inevitably 


Country 

Year 

Malt 

Liquor 

Wines 

Spirits 

Total 

United States. 

1910 

20.09 

0.66 

1 45 

22.20 

United Kingdom. 

1909 

31.44 

0.31 

0.96 

32.71 

Germany. 

1910 

26.47 

1.16 

1.48 

29.11 

France. 

1909 

9.51 

39.36 

1.81 

50.68 

Austria. 

1909 

17.17 

6.34 

1 81 

25.32 

Belgium. 

1909 

55 20 

1.21 

1.42 

57.83 

Sweden. 

1909 

13.31 

No data 

1.57 

14.88 

Switzerland. 

1909 

18.00 

14.55 

0.99 

33.54 

Denmark. 

1909 

22.98 

No data 

2.97 

25 95 

Italy. 

1909 

0.51 

31.17 

0 76 

32 44 

Australia. 

1909 

13.20 

1.30 

1 07 

15.57 

Canada. 

1910 

6.36 

0.12 

0.97 

7.45 



The present situation was not 
brought about suddenly, but by steady 
progress. It is a logical stage in the 
development of a higher civilization. 

A Prophecy 

The late F. S. Spence, Canada’s 
greatest prohibition leader, in an 
address made in 1908 before prohibition 
became effective said: 

The story of the fight against the liquor 
power is the same in Canada as it is in the 
United States, and as it is throughout all 
Christendom. It is a story of stern effort 
and steady progress, to which there can be 
only one result of a failure to understand the 
end of the movement. That movement is 
not a mere human invention or fake, created 


and irresistibly go on, until either the moral 
purpose dies out or the evil is overthrown. 
This is the origin of this great reform; the 
awful curse of intemperance and the God- 
given desire to be rid of it. 

Therefore, if you could wipe the whole 
movement out of existence, with all its 
literature, its agencies, its methods and 
forms, but leave the curse and the God-in¬ 
spired purpose, you would have the whole 
history over again. Progressing through 
all the stages it has passed, that movement 
would come to exactly the same position in 
which it stands today, and go on to the 
future victory that lies ahead, and we trust 
not very far away. Just as surely as to¬ 
morrow will follow today, so surely will the 
suppression of the liquor traffic follow the 
unholy system of encouraging, of protect- 




























Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


231 


ing and licensing that traffic by so-called— 
and shamefully miscalled—Christian leg¬ 
islation. 

Today we see this prophecy fulfilled 
in part. 

Reformers are often impatient for 
results. It would be strange indeed if 
an age-long evil, such as that of the 
liquor traffic, deeply imbedded in 
tradition, custom, and desire, could be 
utterly eradicated in a few days merely 
by adding a few sections to our stat¬ 
utes. It will take generations before 
the full fruition is seen of the passing of 
our prohibitory laws, and before they 
are humanly perfect for the accomplish¬ 
ment of their intended purpose. 

Beginnings 

Organized temperance effort began 
early in the 19th century. In its 
initial stage, here and elsewhere, it took 
the form of a pledge-signing move¬ 
ment. This was followed by the 
organization of temperance societies 
for mutual encouragement and the 
propagation of abstinence principles. 

Students of the problem of intemper¬ 
ance soon found an inexorable law 
operating: that drinking and drunk¬ 
enness, with all their attendant evils, 
were in proportion to the social facili¬ 
ties afforded for the obtaining of intoxi¬ 
cants. That as facilities were increased, 
drinking and drunkenness became 
greater; as the facilities were decreased, 
drinking and drunkenness were less¬ 
ened. In the school of hard experience 
they further learned that, while per¬ 
sonal habit could be best dealt with by 
educational and suasional means, the 
social institution of the “liquor traffic” 
could be dealt with only by law. They 
therefore proceeded to invoke law to 
stop the facilities for the supplying of 
the liquor that caused the evil. To 
stop by law is prohibition. 

Prohibition is a principle which may 
have a partial or larger application. 


It is the principle of prohibition which 
is contained in every law restricting the 
facilities for the supplying of intoxi¬ 
cating liquor, whether it be called 
“license,” “government control,” 
“dispensary system,” or “prohibition.” 
These laws are all fundamentally pro¬ 
hibitory; they may be said to embody 
various degrees of prohibition. No¬ 
where in Canada is there a total pro¬ 
hibition law. 

In these days of experiments with 
so-called “government control,” we 
are learning this lesson afresh, and are 
finding that the evils that come from 
the use of alcoholic beverages can never 
be remedied by affording facilities for 
men to get such beverages to use. On 
the contrary, if it is made easier, by 
law, for men to keep sober, and harder 
for men to get drunk, more men will 
keep sober, and fewer will get drunk. 

Early Legislation 

Sentiment in the Dominion of Can¬ 
ada is, and has always been, strongly 
against the liquor traffic. 

In 1855 the province of New Bruns¬ 
wick enacted a law prohibiting the 
importation, manufacture, and sale of 
intoxicating beverages. Because of 
political complications, the measure 
was repealed within a year. 

In 1864 the legislature of Canada 
passed the “Dunkin Act.” It gave 
the counties, cities, towns, villages and 
townships of Ontario and Quebec 
authority to prohibit the retail sale of 
liquor within their respective limits. 
The law, though crude and full of 
weaknesses, did good in reducing crime 
and drunkenness where it was honestly 
enforced. 

In 1867 Nova Scotia and New 
Brunswick w T ere confederated with the 
old provinces of Upper and Lower 
Canada under the name of “The Do¬ 
minion of Canada.” 

There arose now a serious difficulty— 




232 


The Annals of the American Academy 


uncertainty as to the relative extent of 
Dominion and Provincial power in the 
enactment of prohibitory legislation. 
The British North America Act, which 
defined the terms of Confederation, 
dealt with the subject of jurisdiction 
only in general terms. There has 
therefore been much long, tedious, 
expensive litigation, and the sub¬ 
mission to courts of test cases on 
various matters. 

The prohibition movement has 
suffered particularly from this juris¬ 
diction difficulty, which is a serious 
hindrance to the enactment and en¬ 
forcement of prohibitory legislation. 

But, while this jurisdiction difficulty 
continues unto this day, there has been 
little effort upon the part of politicians 
to solve or remove it. Indeed it has 
proved to many a very present help in 
time of political trouble, and a “ready 
to order” excuse for inaction when the 
demand for legislation, either Domin¬ 
ion or Provincial, became too insistent. 

Constitutional Difficulties 

This jurisdiction difficulty arises 
because of the fact that the British 
North America Act, which forms the 
Charter or Constitution of the Domin¬ 
ion, and its various provinces, specif¬ 
ically assigned certain powers to the 
provinces, and certain powers to the 
federal authority. Any other func¬ 
tions, not specifically and definitely 
assigned to the provinces, lies within 
the Dominion jurisdiction: there is the 
residue of power. 

There are certain things regarding 
which there is concurrent jurisdiction 
of both Provincial and Dominion. In 
such matters, in the absence of com¬ 
petent Dominion legislation, Provin¬ 
cial laws have full force; but, where 
there is overlapping legislation, and the 
same point is constitutionally covered 
by both National and Provincial leg¬ 
islation, the Dominion enactment is 


supreme, and sets aside the Provincial 
law. 

An interesting illustration of this is 
in the district of Manitoulin in the 
province of Ontario. In that district, 
a Dominion local option measure (The 
Canada Temperance Act) is in force, 
prohibiting the sale of liquor. In that 
district, therefore, the Provincial pro¬ 
hibition law is not operative. It ap¬ 
plies to every other part of the province 
except Manitoulin. Prosecutions there 
have to be made under the federal 
statute. 

Roughly speaking, the relative 
powers of the Dominion and prov¬ 
inces are as follows: 

The Dominion Government has the 
exclusive jurisdiction over manufac¬ 
ture, importation, exportation and in¬ 
terprovincial shipment of liquor. Brew¬ 
eries and distilleries operate under 
Dominion charters; excise and cus¬ 
toms are departments of the Dominion 
Government. Trade and commerce, 
particularly interprovincial trade, is 
also within federal jurisdiction. 

Provinces have power to regulate or 
prohibit the sale of liquor within the 
province, and generally all matters of a 
local or private nature within the prov¬ 
ince. The law of the province of 
Ontario, for instance, prohibits the 
selling or keeping of liquor for sale 
anywhere within the province; also the 
keeping, having or giving of liquor 
anywhere in the province, except in a 
private house. 

There are in Ontario, licensed by the 
federal Government, six distilleries and 
twenty-nine breweries, who have the 
right to manufacture liquor, also the 
right to sell liquor for export from 
the province. 

The old Dunkin Act, being a pre- 
Confederation Act of the two provinces 
of Ontario and Quebec, had no applica¬ 
tion to the Maritime Provinces, and 
deputations and petitions to the new 


Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


federal Parliament voiced the growing 
demand for a law of Dominion-wide 
prohibition. 

Pleading uncertainty of their legis¬ 
lative powers, the federal Parliament, 
in the face of strong pressure, delayed 
action until 1878, when it passed, not 
the prohibition law asked for, but a 
Dominion local option law, the “Can¬ 
ada Temperance Act,” which improved 
upon the Dunkin Act in many particu¬ 
lars. This enabled electors in a city or 
county to prohibit by vote the sale of 
intoxicating liquor within their bound¬ 
aries, except for medicinal, sacramental 
or industrial purposes. Its constitu¬ 
tionality was established by the Im¬ 
perial Privy Council in 1882. The 
measure was adopted successfully in 
New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and 
Prince Edward Island. 

Progress by Provinces 

All Prince Edward Island, except in 
the capital city of Charlottetown, was 


233 

a different history, however. In 
Ontario twenty-five counties and 
two cities adopted it, but it was re¬ 
pealed in all of them. It ran a similar 
course in Quebec. The reason for its 
unpopularity in these places was not 
that the Act itself was a failure where 
properly tried. In Ontario, in one 
year of its operation, commitments to 
jail for drunkenness were reduced by 
more than 50 per cent. But various 
circumstances—legal, administrative, 
and political—conspired to interfere 
with its success; dissatisfaction ensued, 
and by 1889 the Act was repealed in 
every locality. 

That the repeal was not due to the 
ebb of prohibition sentiment, how¬ 
ever, is clearly evident from succeeding 
events. 

Repeated requests of the electors for 
the enactment of prohibitory legisla¬ 
tion led four of the provincial govern¬ 
ments to take plebiscites on the ques¬ 
tion, with the following results: 



For 

Prohibition 

Against 

Prohibition 

Majority 

Manitoba. 

19,637 

10,616 

192,489 

43,756 

7,115 

3,390 

110,720 

12,355 

12,522 

7,226 

81,769 

31,401 

Prince Edward Island. 

Ontario. 

Nova Scotia. 



under the Canada Temperance Act, 
and when provincial prohibition was 
brought into force, the Act was in 
operation throughout the whole island. 

Nova Scotia cleared the liquor traffic 
out of every county and city in the prov¬ 
ince except the capital city, Halifax. 

In New Brunswick, nine of the four¬ 
teen counties, and two of the three 
cities were under the operation of the 
Canada Temperance Act, at the time 
of the enactment of the provincial 
prohibitory law. 

In Ontario and Quebec the Act had 


No legislative action followed these 
votes, the provincial assemblies taking 
refuge behind the old excuse of uncer¬ 
tainty as to the extent of their juris¬ 
diction. 

Federal Action and Inaction 

As early as 1884, the federal Parlia¬ 
ment had adopted an historic resolu¬ 
tion to the effect that the right and 
most effectual legislative remedy for 
alcoholism was the enactment and en¬ 
forcement of a law of total prohibition, 
and that the House was prepared, so 






















234 


The Annals of the American Academy 


soon as the public opinion would sus¬ 
tain it, to promote such legislation so 
far as lay within its powers. 

In 1898 the federal Government, in 
its turn, decided to test public opinion 
on the question of prohibition by a 
plebiscite. The results were: 


poll was cast, which resulted in a 
majority of 6,857 against the law be¬ 
coming operative, and tliQ Act was 
repealed. 

The Ontario Government in 1902 
introduced a bill to bring into opera¬ 
tion in that province an Act similar 


Province 

For 

Against 

Quebec. 

28,436 

154,498 

34,678 

26,919 

9,461 

12,419 

5,731 

6,238 

278,380 

t 

122,760 

115,284 

5,370 

9,575 

1,146 

2,978 

4,756 

2,824 

264,693 

Ontario. 

Nova Scotia. 

New Brunswick. 

Prince Edward Island. 

Manitoba. 

British Columbia. 

North-West Territory. 

Total. 



Net majority for, 13,687. 


In spite of this majority in favor of 
prohibition in eight out of nine prov¬ 
inces, the Government declared that 
the results did not justify the introduc¬ 
tion of a prohibitory measure. This 
threw the burden of responsibility 
back upon the provinces to go as far as 
they could constitutionally. 

First Provincial Prohibition Laws 

In 1900, there was passed by the 
Manitoba legislature a drastic measure 
of prohibition of all liquor transactions 
originating and ending within the prov¬ 
ince. The law was declared ultra 
vires of provincial jurisdiction by the 
Supreme Court of Manitoba, but was 
sustained as valid upon appeal to the 
Imperial Privy Council. Instead of 
putting the law into operation, how¬ 
ever, a new government, disclaiming 
responsibility for its enactment, in 1902 
held a referendum on the question of 
its enforcement. Temperance people 
were divided in opinion as to the wis¬ 
dom of the vote, many holding that the 
conditions were unjust. A very small 


to the Manitoba prohibition law, if 
approved by a referendum. The con¬ 
ditions imposed required an aggregate 
vote of 213,723 in favor of the Act. 
The vote polled was as follows: 


For the Act. 199,749 

Against the Act. 103,548 

Majority for the Act. 96,201 


By the government of the day the 
vote was not considered large enough 
to bring the Act into force. 

These Provincial and Dominion 
plebiscites and provincial referenda 
were unequivocal expressions of strong 
public sentiment in favor of prohibition. 
Denied expression in the law of the 
land, that sentiment inevitably sought 
outlet through another channel. There 
was a general turning to the use of 
the local option provisions early incor¬ 
porated in the provincial license laws, 
and heretofore practically neglected 
in efforts to obtain from federal and 
provincial parliaments more compre¬ 
hensive and thoroughgoing legislation. 

























Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


23 5 


Local Option 

These local option laws provided 
that any municipality might enact a 
by-law prohibiting the retail sale of 
liquor within its limits. The case of 
Ontario may be cited, it being a prov¬ 
ince in which the local option method 
was widely adopted. There a by-law 
was to be passed first by the municipal 
council and then ratified by a vote of 
the electors. The following table 
illustrates the progress in that province: 


meant practical demonstrations of the 
business, social and moral benefits of 
its operation. People saw the good 
results in other places and adopted the 
measure for themselves. Thus the 
movement grew from the earliest be¬ 
ginnings of the first pledge-signers. 
Public opinion was built up by sound 
educational methods and brought forth 
a certain measure of prohibitory legis¬ 
lation. That legislation, imperfect as 
it was, nevertheless proved a means of 


Year 

Total 

Municipalities 

Wet 

Dry 

Majority 

Wet 

Majority 

Dry 

No. OF 
Licenses 

1875. 






6,185 

1885. 

• • • 

. • • 

• . • 

• • . 


3,970 

1895. 


. . . 

. . , 

• • • 


3,151 

1905. 

794 

607 

187 

420 


2,836 

1906. 

794 

552 

252 

310 


2,691 

1907. 

794 

508 

286 

222 


2,521 

1908. 

804 

492 

312 

180 


2,432 

1909. 

807 

475 

332 

143 


2,328 

1910. 

812 

407 

405 

2 

• • • 

2,200 

1911. 

822 

380 

440 


60 

1,938 

1912. 

828 

365 

463 


98 

1,841 

1913. 

835 

333 

502 


169 

1,774 

1914. 

842 

322 

520 


198 

1,686 

1915. 

847 

305 

542 


237 

1,610 

1916. 

851 

277 

574 


297 

1,519 


In Quebec, even in 1898, 603 munici¬ 
palities out of a total of 933 had for¬ 
bidden the sale of liquor within their 
boundaries. The use of the local option 
method was continued until, in 1917, 
1,097 of the 1,187 municipalities of the 
province were then under no license. 
Today nine-tenths of the municipali¬ 
ties of Quebec are still local prohibition. 

In the province of Manitoba, out of 
158 municipalities, 87 went dry. 

Similar methods were used by the 
other provinces of the West, except 
British Columbia, which never had a 
local option law. 

Preparation for Prohibition 
The gaining of local prohibition 


further education. It taught the 
worth of the prohibition principle by 
the sure method of experiment and 
example and laid the foundation for a 
larger and better law. 

One proof of this is that, during 
these years of local option campaigning, 
opportunity was given for the repeal of 
prohibition any time after it had been 
in force for three years. For instance, 
in the province of Ontario such was its 
success that in the last six years of the 
local option period, out of 1,330 
opportunities for repeal, in 1,260 cases 
the law was so firmly established that 
there was not even sufficient opposition 
to bring the matter to a vote. Seventy 
repeal contests were brought on in the 









































236 


The Annals of the American Academy 


six years. The law was sustained in 
69 of these, and repealed in only one 
solitary instance. 

The local option laws—federal and 
provincial—which supplemented the 
license laws, were only partial measures 
and contained serious elements of weak¬ 
ness. As local option spread, a diffi¬ 
culty arose because of the contiguity 
of wet and dry areas. Local option in 
any locality did not interfere with the 
working of license in an adjoining or 
adjacent locality, but adjacent licenses 
did interfere with the successful opera¬ 
tion of local prohibition. The more 
the provinces became checker-boarded 
with “local option” and “license” and, 
particularly, when the local option 
areas gained preponderance, the li¬ 
censes in the remaining territory 
became, not simply a matter of local 
concern to be dealt with by action of 
the people of that municipality, but a 
matter of general concern, to be dealt 
with only by a general law. Thus, 
local option paved the way and created 
the demand for the logical next step— 
provincial prohibition. 

Provincial Prohibition 

There is no doubt that the outbreak 
of the w r ar helped to hasten the move¬ 
ment against the legalized liquor 
traffic in Canada. The imperative 
demand for efficiency and economy 
gave force to the appeal for immediate 
action. But prohibition as it exists in 
Canada today is not a moral whim, nor 
was it brought about by war conditions. 
It is rather the expression, in legisla¬ 
tion, of a growing determination to 
suppress the evils of the liquor traffic. 

Many reasons contributed to the 
success of the prohibition movement. 

Business men, manufacturers, rail¬ 
way corporations, miners, lumbermen, 
in seeking the highest efficiency in the 
conduct of their various industries, 
found the liquor traffic w r as like sand in 


the machinery. Wage earners, farm¬ 
ers, industrial workers, saw their earn¬ 
ing pow r er lessened. Merchants saw 
cash going over the bar instead of over 
the counter, while the lower standard 
of living, through drinking habits, 
meant a lesser demand for goods of all 
kinds. Educators saw children run¬ 
ning the streets or w T orking in factories 
instead of attending school, and intel¬ 
lectual development thus hampered by 
intemperance. Insurance statistics 
demonstrated the greater longevity 
of abstainers. Medical science pro¬ 
nounced against the use of alcohol as a 
beverage. Indeed, progressive men 
in practically every department of 
human activity found the liquor traffic 
hurtful. Added to all this was the 
influence of the Christian church, and 
the desire upon the part of those work¬ 
ing for the social betterment and moral 
uplift of the people, w T ho saw r in the 
liquor traffic an enemy and hindrance 
to all good and an ally of everything 
evil. 

Another class helped on prohibition. 
This w T as made up of the victims of 
intemperance, many of wdiom voted to 
give themselves and their families a 
fresh start under better conditions. 

Provincial Action 

By a general survey of the provinces 
the progressive development through¬ 
out Canada may be seen. 

Prince Edward Island was the first 
to go dry. In 1900 a provincial prohi¬ 
bition act was passed. At first it 
applied only to Charlottetown, since 
a Dominion measure—the Canada 
Temperance Act—which was in opera¬ 
tion in the counties, took precedence 
over the provincial law. But the 
validity of this first provincial prohibi¬ 
tory law being finally established by 
the Supreme Court in 1902, the Domin¬ 
ion measure was repealed in the coun¬ 
ties and the entire island was thus 


Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


237 


brought under provincial prohibition. 

In 1010 the Nova Scotia legislature 
enacted a provincial prohibitory law, 
the city of Halifax, however, being 
exempted. On September 16, 1916, 
Halifax was also brought under its 
operation. 

In New Brunswick the provincial 
law went into operation on May 1,1917. 
In 1920 the electors, by a majority of 
20,667, voted in favor of the retention 
of the law and gave a majority of 
14,662 against the sale of light wines 
and beer. 

In 1916 the leaders of both political 
parties in Ontario joined hands in pass¬ 
ing the Ontario Temperance Act, which 
was carried by a unanimous vote of the 
members of the legislature and went 
into operation the same year on Sep¬ 
tember 17. In 1919 the electors voted 
on the question of its continuance as it 
stood, or with three proposed modifica¬ 
tions. The Act was sustained by a 
majority of 407,789, and every prop¬ 
osition to weaken it was overwhelm¬ 
ingly defeated. 

The Manitoba Situation 

The Manitoba legislature in 1915 
passed a prohibition act which was to 
be subject to ratification by the people. 
The voting the following year gave a 
majority of 24,595 in favor of the law, 
every constituency but one returning a 
favorable vote. The law went into 
operation in 1916. 

During 1921 and 1922 there devel¬ 
oped strong opposition to the measure 
and, to the newly elected legislature, 
early in 1923, petitions were presented 
from the Moderation League asking 
for the inauguration of a system some¬ 
what similar to that in force in British 
Columbia, and hotels asking permission 
to sell wine and beer in hotels, but the 
legislature decided to put both ques¬ 
tions to a vote, but on separate days. 

The proposition of the Moderation 


League was voted upon on June 21, 
1923, and carried by a majority of 
approximately 40,000. On July 11, 
1923, the hotel keepers’ proposition 
was voted upon, but was defeated by a 
majority of approximately 35,000. 
The latter vote, however, was very 
small. 

Manitoba has an exceedingly large 
foreign-born population, probably the 
largest of any province in Canada. 
Older rural sections of Manitoba, in 
which the Anglo-Saxon people pre¬ 
dominated, gave substantial majorities 
for prohibition, but the cities and non- 
English-speaking districts voted for 
government sale. That the mind of 
the people is not to reestablish the 
liquor traffic is proven by the result of 
the second vote. A special session of 
the legislature is called to deal with the 
situation created by these votes. This 
session will be held in the latter part of 
July. 

In 1915 the Saskatchewan legisla¬ 
ture passed an act closing all the bars 
and the thirty-eight liquor stores of the 
province, but established government 
dispensaries for the retail sale of 
liquor in original packages in twenty- 
two of the principal cities and towns. 
These dispensaries were made subject 
to local option and were promptly 
wiped out in six districts. A provincial 
referendum the following year on the 
question of abolishing the remainder 
resulted in a vote of 95,249 to 23,666 
in favor of their abolition. The law 
giving effect to this demand and thus 
bringing the province under provincial 
prohibition became operative on Jan¬ 
uary 1, 1917. 

The province of Alberta in 1915 
voted on provincial prohibition, which 
was approved by a majority of 21,086, 
the total vote being nearly two to one. 
The Act went into force in 1916. 

Another vote of the electors of Al¬ 
berta will be taken in November of this 


238 


The Annals of the American Academy 


year, when four questions will be sub¬ 
mitted: (a) prohibition, (b) license 

sale of beer, (c) government sale of beer, 
(d) government sale of all liquors. 

Federal Action 

The war, undoubtedly, was in the 
main responsible for the bringing into 
force temporarily of a nation-wide 
measure of prohibition. 

In the fall of 1917 a union govern¬ 
ment was formed in Canada to con¬ 
centrate more effectively all national 
energy upon the great task of winning 
the war. One of the first acts of this 
new government was to declare for a 
measure of national prohibition. The 
prohibition Order-in-Council was dated 
the 11th day of March, 1918, and the 
Regulation stated that it was passed, 
“in order to still further prevent waste, 
to promote thrift, to conserve resources 
and thus to increase national efficien¬ 
cy.” The order prohibited the manufac¬ 
ture of intoxicating liquor in Canada, 
the importation of liquor into Canada 
and the transportation of liquor to any 
part of Canada wherein the sale of such 
liquor was by law prohibited. The 
order came into force on the first day 
of April, 1918, and remained in force 
until the 31st of December, 1919. 

It should be noted that this order 
was so framed as to apply only to 
matters wholly within Dominion ju¬ 
risdiction, and did not impinge at 
all upon any provincial prohibitory 
laws. It will be further noted in tables 
which follow that, during the time this 
Dominion law was in force, the maxi¬ 
mum of good results were obtained in 
every province of Canada, again prov¬ 
ing that, “the tighter the law, the 
fewer get ‘tight.’ ” 

At the session of Parliament in 1920, 
following the repeal of the temporary 
war-time prohibition, the Dominion 
Government passed an amendment to 
the Canada Temperance Act, under 


which the legislature of any province, 
in which there was at the time in force 
a law prohibiting the sale of intoxicat¬ 
ing liquor for beverage purposes, could, 
by resolution, ask the Dominion Gov¬ 
ernment to take a vote of the electors 
of such province upon the question of 
prohibiting the importation of liquor 
into the province, and, if a majority of 
electors so decided, then such prohi¬ 
bition would be brought into force by 
Dominion proclamation, and there¬ 
after it would be an offense to import, 
send, take or transport into such prov¬ 
ince any intoxicating liquor for bever¬ 
age purposes. The provisions of this 
Act were invoked by every prohibition 
province in Canada, and came into 
force in these provinces on the follow¬ 
ing dates: Nova Scotia, Manitoba, 
Saskatchewan and Alberta, February 
1, 1921, Ontario, July 19, 1921; New 
Brunswick, June 17, 1922; Prince 
Edward Island, May 21, 1923. These 
acts are still all in force. 

At the session of the Dominion 
Parliament of 1922 a further amend¬ 
ment was passed by which, on the 
request, by Order-in-Council, of any 
provincial government, the Dominion 
Government would pass an Order-in- 
Council prohibiting the exportation of 
liquor from any Province except by 
brewers and distillers. This law has 
been invoked by a number of the 
provinces, and came into force on the 
following dates: Saskatchewan, Decem¬ 
ber 15, 1922; Alberta, March 15, 1923; 
Manitoba, June 1, 1923; Prince Edward 
Island, August 31, 1923. 

These laws, Dominion and Provin¬ 
cial, constitute the measure of prohi¬ 
bition enjoyed by the people of Canada, 
which, it will be seen, varies greatly in 
the different provinces. 

Nowhere in Canada is manufacture 
prohibited, and from no part of Canada 
is exportation by brewers or distillers 
forbidden. 


Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


239 


Rum Running Facilitated 

Herein lies the greatest practical 
difficulties to the enforcement of the 
prohibition laws which obtain through¬ 
out Canada. 

Take the province of Ontario as an 
illustration. There is a substantial 
demand for liquor, a hang-over from the 
old license days. Many people yet 
have the appetite and desire for intoxi¬ 
cants. On the other hand there are, 
in the province of Ontario, six distiller¬ 
ies and twenty-nine breweries manu¬ 
facturing just that brand of booze that 
will assuage the aforesaid thirst. It 
is difficult, if not impossible, to keep 
the demand and supply apart. So 
long as liquor is legally made, and 
people have thirsts, and when this 
demand and supply are as close to¬ 
gether as in Ontario, it is difficult to 
keep the liquor and thirst from con¬ 
necting up. 

Particularly is this true when the 
liquor may be legally moved from the 
place of manufacture to the interna¬ 
tional border, presumably for export. 
It starts out in truck loads, car loads, 
boat loads, towards every conceivable 
point upon the border, and melts away 
in transit. Even if it reaches the 
border, that is not necessarily the end 
of it so far as Canada is concerned, 
because much of the international 
boundary of the province of Ontario is 
water; indeed, practically all, save a 
narrow stretch of land west of Port 
Arthur and Duluth. 

Customs clearance papers are given 
to shipments of liquor, the liquor is put 
on board a boat presumably destined 
for another country, and the liquor 
starts from Canadian shores. The 
boat comes back, but where the liquor 
goes, no one knows, nor is there any 
way of tracing. 

For instance, in the ten miles of 
frontier in the vicinity of Detroit, it is 


estimated that over a thousand cases 
of liquor a day are legally shipped 
from Canada upon vessels bound to 
one place or another. It starts out 
into the Detroit River. That liquor 
cannot land legally upon the American 
shore, nor can it legally land on the 
Canadian shore, and there are only 
two shores to the river. There is no 
assurance that it lands on the Ameri¬ 
can side, nor is there any assurance that 
it does not land on the Canadian 
side. As a matter of fact much 
of this liquor, ostensibly shipped 
abroad, comes back into the hands of 
Canadian “bootleggers.” Thus our 
Dominion permissions make difficult 
the enforcement of provincial prohibi¬ 
tions. 

Recently a boat was cleared with a 
cargo of liquor from a Bellville distillery 
bound for Mexico City, Mexico. It 
was wrecked on the north coast of 
Lake Erie, 250 miles inland, in the op¬ 
posite direction from its alleged des¬ 
tination. 

Enforcement 

Generally speaking, Canadian en¬ 
forcement is superior to that of the 
United States. The Canadian system 
of administration makes for this. 
Under it, administrative authority is 
centralized under what is termed “the 
Crown, ” and all administrative officers 
are appointed by the “Crown” (which 
is the government in power). These 
officers are not therefore swayed 
by local considerations or sentiment. 

On the other hand, the United 
States Federal Prohibition Law is far 
in advance of anything in Canada. 
It may be frankly stated that if the 
United States authorities were working 
with a law as full of defects as our pro¬ 
vincial prohibition enactments, the re¬ 
sult would probably not be good. But 
if, with the Canadian quality of en¬ 
forcement, we had the United States 


240 


The Annals of the American Academy 


quality of law, Canada would be abso¬ 
lutely bone “dry,” with correspond¬ 
ingly good results. 

The coming of prohibition in the 
provinces of Canada did not make as 
sharp a break with existing conditions 
as if the evil had been more widespread. 
The resulting contrast therefore is not 
such a striking one as elsewhere. For 
instance, compare the city of Toronto, 
and the city of Buffalo. In Toronto 
before prohibition came into force 
there were 110 bars which were open 
from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. on week days; 
were closed Sundays, Christmas, New 
Year’s Day, and on election days; did 
not sell to persons under twenty-one, 
to interdicts, or intoxicated persons; 
did not sell liquor to be taken from the 
premises or to be consumed on any 
other part of the premises other than 
the bar; there were only 50 shops, and, 
in these, liquor could not be consumed 
on the premises. Whereas, in the city 
of Buffalo, with a smaller population, 
there were over 1,200 saloons and 
liquor-selling places with longer hours, 
wider-open sale. Yet in the city of 
Toronto prohibition has wrought a 
moral revolution, and the results in 
Toronto are but an index to what has 
happened in the other cities through¬ 
out Canada. 

Two Liquor-Selling Provinces 

In two provinces of Canada, British 
Columbia and Quebec, liquor is still 
legally sold; and in both under a so- 
called system of “government control.” 
British Columbia, following the lead of 
the other provinces, passed a prohib¬ 
itory law which came into force on 
April 1, 1918, and remained in force 
till June 15, 1921, when the present law 
was brought into operation. This law 
provides that all liquor shall be sold 
through Government dispensaries and 
only to persons who have permits to 
buy. These permits cost $5 a year for 


a resident, and 50 cents for a visitor to 
make a single purchase. 

In Quebec the provincial Govern¬ 
ment in 1918 passed a prohibition bill 
which was to come into force on May 1, 
1919. At the session of the provincial 
legislature, early in 1919, however, it 
was decided to submit to the electors 
the question of exempting beer and 
wine from the prohibition act. The 
question on the referundum ballot 
appeared simply: “Is it your opinion 
that the sale of light beer and cider and 
wine, as defined by law, should be 
allowed?” 

The law provided for beer contain¬ 
ing not more than 2.51 per cent alcohol 
weight measure, and wine or cider con¬ 
taining not more than 6.4 per cent alco¬ 
hol weight measure. A majority was 
given in favor of beer and wine. The 
act went into force restricting the sale 
of spirituous liquors, and strong beer 
and wine to Government dispensaries, 
and only for medicinal and sacramental 
purposes. Beer and wine were per¬ 
mitted to be sold in hotels and restau¬ 
rants. 

A most unsatisfactory situation 
resulted, and within two years the 
Government by a special Act took 
over the entire liquor business, which 
is now operated by a commission of 
five members. This commission con¬ 
trols the sales and delivery of all 
alcoholic liquor in the province and 
grants permits and licenses to grocer¬ 
ies, hotels, restaurants, beer gardens, 
steamers and dining cars. Beer may 
be sold direct by brewers to license 
holders, the Government collecting a 
commission of 5 per cent upon the sales. 

In the main there are three kinds of 
licenses issued: 

(1) Grocery. These authorize the 
holder to sell beer in any quantity to be 
delivered to the customers at their 
homes. 

(2) Cafe, These authorize the 


Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


241 


holder to sell beer for consumption on 
the premises; no bars are allowed. 
Customers must sit at tables and drink. 
There is some argument as to whether 
a man can hold more standing at a bar, 
or sitting at a table. Experience 
would seem to show that he can get 
full either way. 

(3) Hotel. Beer and wine may be 
served in licensed hotels at meals. 

The sale of spirituous liquors and 
wines, except for consumption on the 
premises, is a monopoly of the Govern¬ 
ment and is conducted through dis¬ 
pensaries which have been established 
throughout the province. 

Anyone may purchase liquor of any 
kind, but of spirituous liquors only one 
bottle will be sold to a customer at one 
time. To get more than one bottle 
a person must go out and in the dis¬ 
pensary door as many times as he 
wants bottles. 

Results in these liquor-selling prov¬ 
inces, compared with those wherein 
there is in force a form of prohibition, 
emphatically demonstrate the sound¬ 
ness of our original proposition, that 
drinking and drunkenness are in pro¬ 
portion to the facilities for the getting 
of liquor. 

In British Columbia, where liquor is 
only sold upon permit, facts show that 
these permits do not really restrict the 
sale. On the back of a permit held by 
a woman, endorsements show the 
amount of liquor obtained in one week 
on this particular permit to be: 

August 


9. 5 doz. beer, 2 bottles rum 

10 . 5 doz. beer, 2 bottles Scotch 

11 . 5 doz. beer, 2 bottles rum 

12 . 5 doz. beer, 2 bottles Scotch 

13 . 5 doz. beer, 2 bottles rum 

15 . 5 doz. beer, 2 bottles rum 

16 . 5 doz. beer, 1 bottle Scotch 


For the six months ending March 
31, 1923, the sales in the Government 
stores amounted to $5,029,376, which 


is an increase of $884,219.23 over the 
corresponding period twelve months 
before. This means a drink bill of over 
$10,000,000 a year, or over $19 per 
capita. In 1911 the per capita expend¬ 
iture for all Canada was only $11.30. 

This, however, is only part of the 
actual expenditure. British Columbia 
is a bootlegger’s paradise. An exam¬ 
ination by the present Attorney-Gen¬ 
eral on coming into office showed that 
the Government stores were not han¬ 
dling 50 per cent of the liquor sold in 
the province. 

The press of Vancouver, on August 
1, 1922, stated that, 

during the past three months over sixty 
thousand cases of liquor have arrived from 
Great Britain and less than five thousand 
were consigned to the Liquor Control 
Board. 

H. PI. Stevens, M.P., in a public 
address in Vancouver recently made 
the following statement: 

Never in the history of the country, was 
bootlegging comparable in magnitude and 
murderous results to what it is today. 

He quoted a case of one man who got 
96 barrels of beer in one month, another 
169 in the same period and one woman 
appeared in court in a suit to recover 
$18,000 from her partner in the boot¬ 
legging business as her share in the 
profits in sixteen months. He said: 

Drinking clubs have sprung up like 
mushrooms evervwhere—hundreds of them 
exist all over the province. 

Certainly an enormous amount of 
money is being actually drawn from the 
legitimate business of the country. 
So serious is this that the Retail Mer¬ 
chants’ Association of Vancouver re¬ 
cently passed a strong memorial in 
which it was said: 

Whereas the business of the retail grocers 
is suffering very heavily from the diversion 
of money into liquor channels, which should 

V«0 'U... ... 


17 









242 


The Annals of the American Academy 


be spent legitimately to supply foods and 
other necessities and comforts for the 
people; and Whereas, merchants in other 
lines are similarly affected by the heavy 
and wasteful expenditures for liquor. 
Therefore, be it resolved that this section 
recommend to the Provincial Executive 
that this resolution be circulated among 
the various branches of the province to 
ascertain if they are in favor of the Retail 
Merchants’ Association requesting the Gov¬ 
ernment to take a plebiscite, at an early 
date, on the prohibition of the sale and 
importation of liquor in the province. 

Some of the results which evidence 
that “government control” does not 
establish Utopian conditions, is shown 
by the following extract from the 
Vancouver World of January 12, of this 
year: 

Marching with military precision, headed 
by marshals of their own election, who acted 
as spokesmen, some 200 workless single 
men invaded the police station this morn¬ 
ing and demanded that they be taken into 
custody and given food and clothing. They 
were not accommodated. 

“We do not want to break the law” said 
their leader when he had been given an 
interview by Chief Anderson, “but these 
boys are desperate and want to get by 
without breaking the law. If they are 
caught begging they will be arrested and 
jailed, so they have come here to give them¬ 
selves up voluntarily; take us into custody 
and give us food and clothing.” 

Moreover, the provincial debt is 
increasing by leaps and bounds, and the 
municipalities of the province who 
receive 50 per cent of the profits from 
the dispensaries are in financial dif¬ 
ficulties. 

Recently the City Council of Van¬ 
couver submitted to the rate-payers 
money by laws amounting to $1,050,000 
for local improvements. They were 
all voted down because of the high 
taxation obtaining. The Associated 
Property Owners of Vancouver, who 
led the campaign against the expendi¬ 
ture, cited the following reasons: 


That taxes had increased from 
1917 to 1922, 45 per cent, although 
the population had decreased from 
126,420 to 124,616. 

That there was a deficit of 
$2,345,699 in the sinking fund. 

That 2,843 city lots had reverted 
to the city following tax sales. 

That the arrears of taxes, in 
December, 1922, were $2,427,419. 
Dr. A. E. Cooke, president of the 
Peoples’ Prohibition Movement of 
British Columbia, in an address to the 
City Council of Vancouver recently 
said: 

It is quite evident that under “Modera¬ 
tion” our fair province of British Columbia 
has become a “Mecca” all right, and Van¬ 
couver is becoming a city of refuge for all 
the whisky-soaks and booze artists of this 
whole hemisphere. When the present 
Act came into force, the grand march of the 
Booze Battalions began, and the thirsty 
topers and crooks and gamblers and har¬ 
lots, from every place where whisky is ban¬ 
ished, began to arrive in British Columbia. 
And they’re coming yet, coming to compete 
with decent labor, and pull down wages 
for the workingman, and steal his job, 
because they can’t live a mile away from a 
whisky barrel. And Vancouver Harbor, 
according to the World of July 5, is the 
haven of an organized fleet of whisky 
boats that carry liquor and crime, and even 
murder, down the coast, and make the 
name of Canada a byword and thing of 
contempt with decent Americans every¬ 
where. 

In Quebec, the new policy which 
was to make for “moderation” and 
“temperance” has, as a matter of fact, 
manifested itself by legalizing the sale 
of hard liquors for beverage purposes; 
by removal of all restrictions in regard 
to alcoholic content of wine and beer; 
by extension of the hours of sale in 
taverns from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m; by 
increase in the number of licenses for 
liquor selling places from less than 
500 to over 1,500; by removal of re- 


Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


243 


striction which forbade the issuance of 
a license in close proximity to a school, 
church or hospital; taking away the 
right of a majority of voters to prevent 
granting of licenses; by permission for 
the employment of women and girls in 
cafes and taverns; by restoration of 
beer gardens with the usual under¬ 
world accompaniments. 

From an article on the Quebec 
liquor situation by Dr. E. I. Hart of 
Montreal, the following is taken: 

One night in November last at ten 
o’clock, the hour of closing, I stood on 
Bleury Street, just above St. Catherine 
Street, and watched the entrances of two 
cafes licensed to sell liquors. From one 
place issued nine young men, from the other 
three young men, and all more or less 
visibly under the influence of liquor, all 
staggering, some trying to help one another 
along the street. A visitor from the West, 
who spent a few days in this city not long 
ago, accompanied the police in a series of 
raids made after midnight upon a number 
of cafes and disorderly houses. At two 
o’clock Sunday morning they went into a 
well-known and “most respectable” cafe 
on St. Catherine Street, near Windsor 
Street, and discovered men and girls en¬ 
joying the hilarious glass. 

The Montreal Standard , in a last Novem¬ 
ber issue, contained an account of the 
shocking disclosures made in several raids 
by plain-clothes-men on certain cafes in 
this city, where mere boys and girls gather 
for hours in little rooms or private com¬ 
partments and indulge in drinks and most 
unbecoming language and conduct. Five 
times in ten days was one restaurant 
raided by the police, and each time from 
eight to a dozen boys and girls from four¬ 
teen to nineteen years of age were found 
crowded into a compartment designed for 
four people, some of the girls perched upon 
the knees of the boys. It is not uncommon 
to witness the pitiful sight of a girl of six¬ 
teen in one of our court rooms, after an 
experience in one of these cafes and its 
consequent sequel, saying, “I met him in 
a cafe, ”or, “She took me into a cafe.” 

The cafes and restaurants of this city are 


becoming more and more the haunts of the 
social evil vampire and the drug-vendor. 
We cannot disassociate these three evils— 
drink, the social vice, and drugs. They go 
together. They are the “Big Three” in 
the American world of vice. Where one is 
found you will almost invariably find the 
other. 

The brothel and the bottle are insepa¬ 
rable. An ex-mistress of the under-world 
once said to me, “You are anxious to clean 
out the Red-Light District. That is easy— 
cut out the drink. We can do nothing with 
a sober man, but we can do anything with 
a man under the influence of liquor.” 

The Chief of Police of Hull, Quebec, 
declared a few weeks ago that he had 
noticed a marked increase in drinking dur¬ 
ing the last year among girls, and he gave 
his opinion that this is the real cause of the 
biggest part of the white slave traffic in the 
city. These statements throw additional 
light upon the significant words of Dr. 
Haywood of Montreal’s General Hospital 
in his address before the Canadian Club in 
January last, that “Montreal is now the 
only city in America with a recognized 
Red-Light District.” Every other large 
city in America is under prohibition. 

In the city of Hull last fall the Commis¬ 
sion rounded up fifty-five persons in one 
“clean-up” who were engaged in this busi¬ 
ness (bootlegging). Every day we read of 
arrests of bootleggers. Bordeaux jail at 
this time is half filled with bootleggers and 
dope-vendors and addicts. The accommo¬ 
dation is so taxed that many prisoners have 
been sent this winter to Quebec City. 

The bootlegger in this province does not 
have to manufacture “moonshine,” al¬ 
though that is being done. His chief 
source of supply is the Government store, 
where, notwithstanding the law that only 
one bottle can be sold to an individual at 
one time, he can get as many bottles as he 
desires in one day and resell them at large 
profit. A common practice is for a boot¬ 
legger to pay a few cents to a number of 
loafers who secure for him as many as he 
wants. This one-bottle regulation is a 
ridiculous farce. 

The Government may tell us that the 
arrests for drunkenness in the province are 
decreasing in number, but that statement 


244 


The Annals of the American Academy 


has little significance when we remember 
that, under Government sale and control 
as they are conducted in Quebec, it is poor 
policy to arrest any drunken man who is 
not a flagrant disturber of the peace. In 
prohibition areas the reverse policy is 
pursued. I spent last year in Toronto and 
studied conditions under prohibition there. 
I have seen more drunkenness in one day 
in Montreal than I saw in Toronto in a 
whole year. 

If there is general prosperity in Quebec, 
how comes it that only 5 per cent of the 
people of Montreal live in homes of their 
own, compared with 60 per cent in Toronto? 
How comes it that the general death-rate 
and the rate of infant mortality is higher in 
this province than in any other province or 
state in America or Europe? How comes 
it that there were 54,000 men out of em¬ 
ployment in Quebec last year, and that 
locomotive shops, textile, tin-can, sugar, 
and other factories had to shut down for 
more or less time? How is it that savings 
bank deposits in Quebec have been shrink¬ 
ing, while in prohibition territories they 
have been steadily growing? 

The official Government returns 
show that the sales by the dispensaries 
for the year ending April 30, 1922, 
amounted to $15,212,801.21. 

The brewers received for beer sold 
to licensees the sum of $15,684,670. 
This probably cost the consumer at 
least 50 per cent more, or $23,527,005. 

If we add to this the amount paid 
for liquor imported, a conservative 
estimate of the liquor bill of the 
province would be over $40,000,000, 
which is more than it was in the palm¬ 
iest days of license. 

It will be seen that the so-called 
“government control” system in 
Quebec is bringing the inevitable re¬ 
sults which follow any system that 
provides facilities for the getting of 
booze. Immorality, vice and crime 
are rampant, and the people them¬ 
selves are becoming aroused against 
the law. Much of the province of 
Quebec was under prohibition prior to 


the inauguration of the present system, 
and a number of parishes and munici¬ 
palities had no license in them, though 
they had not passed a prohibitory law. 
These latter parishes and municipal¬ 
ities were invaded by the Liquor Com¬ 
mission and there has been an effort on 
the part of the liquor interests to bring 
about a repeal of prohibition in other 
dry areas. 

The city of Quebec and the city of 
Hull, which were under the Canada 
Temperance Act, both voted repeal. 
In the district of Montreal eight mu¬ 
nicipalities which had prohibitory by¬ 
laws repealed them in 1921 and 1922. 
On the other hand, however, thirty- 
three municipalities in the same 
district, which were not under prohi¬ 
bition law r s, passed such in 1921 and 
1922. 

It would therefore seem that the 
residents of Quebec, themselves being 
judges, are against the present system; 
and in the proportion of four to one, 
the municipalities are seeking to safe¬ 
guard themselves from the encroach¬ 
ments of this form of the booze busi¬ 
ness. 

“Government Control” 

In the past w r e have waged war 
against the “liquor traffic,” meaning 
the private interests which sought to 
profit by the sale of that which de¬ 
bauched their fellow men. From the 
standpoint of a social student today, 
the “liquor traffic” means trafficking 
in liquor which involves a seller, a 
buyer, and a transaction. The crux 
of the situation is not touched by sub¬ 
stituting the Government for the 
private interests in the sale of liquor. 
It is still the “liquor traffic” whether it 
is conducted by a brew r er, distiller, 
saloon keeper or the Government, and 
where you have liquor bought and sold. 

There is these days a more scientific 
approach to the problem and a single- 


Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


245 


ness of purpose with the idea of trying 
to remedy the evil. This means that 
there must be accurate definitions, 
clear thinking and logical reasoning. 
The trouble with many of the so-called 
“Moderates” is that they do not 
approach the problem with a desire to 
remedy the evil, but in search of a 
method for continuing the sale and use 
of alcoholic beverages. 

One of the catchy phrases of the day 
is “Government control,” and yet 
what is really meant is, “Government 
permission,” or, “Government sale.” 

Many shallow thinkers are led away 
by the nice sound of the words, “Gov¬ 
ernment control.” 

Lowell says: 

Let us speak plain: there is more force in 
names 

Than most men dream of; and a lie may 
keep 

Its throne a whole age longer, if it skulk 
Behind the shield of some fair seeming 
name. 

“Control” means “to exercise re¬ 
striction or directing opinion over”; 
“to dominate”; “to regulate”; hence 
“to hold from action”; “to curb”; 
“to subject”; “to overpower.” Ap¬ 
plied to the traffic in intoxicating liq¬ 
uors this means prohibition. 

The evil of alcoholism does not lie 
only in the sale of alcoholic liquors, 
but also in their use. The fatal, 
foolish mistake of the advocates of 
“ Government control ” is the failure to 
realize that the evil lies in the booze 
itself, rather than in the way it is 
dispensed. Whisky sold by a uni¬ 
formed Government officer will make a 
man drunk as quickly as that obtained 
from a private company under license, 
or from a bootlegger. 

Moderationist Policy 

Our purpose should be to preserve 
the maximum of personal liberty, and 
yet to minimize to the utmost all social 


evils. But, never to be scared or 
diverted from the attacking of wrong, 
or seeking the accomplishing of any 
needed reform, because some men 
prate about personal liberty, and 
desire individual freedom to act in a 
manner which, if generally followed, 
would perpetuate and intensify the 
wrong attacked and the reform sought. 

For instance, there was presented to 
the legislature of the province of 
Ontario a few years ago a largely 
signed petition, the body of which 
contained many beautiful phrases and 
catchy expressions, but, when stripped 
of all verbiage, the point of the peti¬ 
tion was contained in the following 
request: 

A wisely devised licensing of individuals 
to purchase spirituous liquors. 

Permission to purchase beer and wines 
under a system to be devised by the Gov¬ 
ernment. 

Which, being interpreted, means, “ We 
want booze.” 

The campaign of the Moderation 
League of the Province of Ontario, and 
the other provinces of Canada, resolved 
down, simply means, “We want 
booze.” 

II 

The Waking of Prohibition in 
Canada 

In striking contrast with conditions 
in the “Government control” provinces 
of British Columbia and Quebec, are 
conditions in the prohibition provinces 
of Canada. Even the measure of pro¬ 
hibition we have, partial as it is, has 
given the lie to the expressed fears of 
its opponents, and more than fulfilled 
the prophecies of its proponents. 

One difficulty in regard to the secur¬ 
ing of opinions today as to the benefits 
of prohibition, is the distance we are 
from old license conditions, and the 
varying laws that have been operating 
during the past six years. 


246 


The Annals of the American Academy 


For instance, in the province of 
Ontario, the largest province in 
Canada, three fourths of the munici¬ 
palities and more than one half of the 
population was under prohibition, by 
local option, prior to the coming into 
force of provincial prohibition on 
September, 1916; and before that date, 
several war-time restrictions had been 
placed upon the liquor traffic. During 
these six years Dominion war-time 
prohibition was enacted and repealed, 
and then later, importation was pro¬ 
hibited by Dominion enactment. 

Business Men’s Opinions 

In the year 1917, when sharp 
men’s minds was the contrast between 
the form of provincial prohibition in 
force in Ontario, and previous license 
conditions, a questionnaire was sent 
to the members of the Toronto Board 
of Trade by one of the members of that 
organization, who asked his fellow 
members frankly to state their opinion 
upon prohibition and its effect upon 
business. Three hundred and ninety- 
seven replies were received to this ques¬ 
tionnaire, and they came from almost 
every major business concern of the 
city. They were classified as follows: 


Strongly unfavorable. 3 

Mildly unfavorable. 6 

Neutral 22 

Mildly favorable. 25 

Strongly favorable. 341 


Some of this testimony showed the 
effects of prohibition to have been: 

1. Retail and wholesale business increased 
and improved, a larger proportion of cash 
trade, a greater demand for the better class 
of goods. 

2. Increased regularity, punctuality and 
efficiency of workers, resulting in greater 
earnings for labor and larger returns for 
capital. 

3. More employment at better wages, 
better conditions and greater safety of 
work, higher standard of living. 


4. Rent and taxes more promptly paid. 
Artisans building and buying homes for 
themselves. 

5. Home life bettered, wages formerly 
wasted now go for family comforts and 
luxuries. Fathers more fatherly. Moth¬ 
ers more motherly. Children happier. 

6. Savings bank deposits increased. 
Money diverted from bar and liquor shop 
to channels of honorable trade, giving 
health, strength and vitality to business 
generally. 

7. Hotel accommodation improved, now 
quieter, cleaner, safer and more home-like. 

8. Schools and colleges better attended, 
improvement in health and morale of 
pupils, better results from work of teachers. 

9. Decrease in drunkenness and crime, 
fewer police cases, ability to apply prison 
reform methods more successfully. 

10. Poverty and pauperism lessened, 
ignorance and vice diminished, social re¬ 
form work of all kinds helped and made 
effective. 

11. Public health and safety better, 
mortality lower—particularly infant mor¬ 
tality—fewer accidents, greater community 
cleanliness and therefore less communicable 
disease. 

12. Former opponents of prohibition 
have been converted to the support of that 
measure by the operation of the law. 
Public opinion is today much more pro¬ 
nounced in favor of this method of dealing 
with the evil of intemperance than when 
the various laws were enacted. 

In support of the foregoing state¬ 
ments the following quotations from 
typical replies might be quoted. For 
convenience in reference they are 
grouped and numbered in consonance 
with the related paragraph in the 
preceding statement of results: 

(1) Emil Nerlich of Nerlich & Co., Fancy 
Goods. 

“The money which used to be spent in 
liquor is now diverted to other channels and 
mostly spent for comfort and small luxuries 
of the family, or improvement of the homes, 
by which every merchant along the street 
is now benefiting.” 

D. M. McKinnon, General Manager of the 
Commercial Press Ltd. 







Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


247 


‘‘Many customers of retailers who for¬ 
merly wasted their money are now paying 
their bills promptly and are buying more 
goods than before.” 

L. O. Lumbers of the James Lumber Co. 
Ltd. 

“Retail grocers state that they have not 
near the trouble now of getting in their 
money that they had previous to the enforc¬ 
ing of prohibition.” 

John McDonald & Co. Ltd. 

“The retail merchants have had more 
cash customers, wholesale merchants more 
prompt payments and employees have 
given more faithful service.” 

(2) E. K. M. Webb of the Canadian Gen¬ 
eral Electric Co. 

“Before prohibition went into effect you 
were never sure just when the men in the 
factories were going to be away from work, 
and this trouble has been rectified to a 
large extent.” 

W. G. Harris, President of the Canada 
Metal Co. Ltd. 

“There has been a marked improvement 
in the service and regularity of the men.” 

W. B. Northam, General Sales Manager of 
the Dunlop Tire & Rubber Goods, Ltd. 
“If for no other reason than being able to 
keep our factory production up, it has been 
a great success.” 

W. Newman, Works Manager of the Poison 
Iron Works Ltd. 

“Lost time has been cut down 80 per cent. 
Labor disputes are almost entirely absent. 
The general demeanor of the men is much 
pleasanter. We would never consent to go 
back to the old order of affairs.” 

Janies A. Glover of the Standard Fuel Co. 
of Toronto Ltd. 

“Our employees are stronger physically, 
brighter mentally, and now take a pride in 
their work, i.e., our horses receive attention 
which they did not get formerly.” 

(3) R. F. Carter, Secretary of the Fesserton 
Timber Co. Ltd. 

“Every lumber manufacturer we have 
spoken to in regard to the prohibition 
measure has been highly in praise of the 
same, as they find they can get their work 
done much better.” 

J. H. Kennedy of the Toronto Furniture Co. 


“We have noticed a great falling off in 
minor accidents, which were previously 
very numerous.” 

The late Thomas Findley, President of the 
Massey-Harris Co. Ltd. 

“There has been a marked improvement 
in regularity of our employees, particularly 
after pay day.” 

R. J. W. Barker of Jones Bros. & Co. Ltd., 
Manufacturers. 

“The Monday morning absentees have 
entirely vanished; our workmen are 
happier, more contented and are saving 
money.” 

(4) F. B. Robins of Robins, Ltd. 

“We find that the artisan class make 
their payments on lot purchases more 
promptly.” 

J. Pearson, Insurance Broker. 

“A bailiff in the city told me that since 
September, 1916, his business had fallen off 
more than 60 per cent. Rarely now does 
he have to put his men in for the collection 
of rent in the working men’s homes. They 
are now owning and not renting.” 

(5) Miles Vokes of the Vokes Hardware Co. 
“The money that was formerly wasted 

in drink is now used to buy food and com¬ 
forts for wives and children.” 

J. E. O'Farrell of the Noad Farrell Co. 

“Not only are the men working better, 
feeling better, living better, the homes are 
brighter, and the outlook seems more 
promising to them.” 

H. L. Watt, Secretary, Manager of the H. 
L. Watts, Ltd. 

“The women folks have more money to 
spend since the husband is able to take 
home a full envelope.” 

(6) F. B. McFarren, General Manager of 
the Interprovincial Brick Co. 

“Our men, who are paid semimonthly, 
save one pay and live on the other.” 

Henry H. Mason, General Manager of the 
Mason & Risch Ltd. 

“The closing of the bars has been a 
tremendous factor in providing the people 
with money to spend for all kinds of articles 
of merchandise, including our own line.” 

(7) A. O. Hogg of Hogg & Lyttle Ltd.; 
Vice-President, Board of Trade. 

“Hotel accommodation is, on the whole. 



248 


The Annals of the American Academy 


better than when under license. Money for¬ 
merly spent for liquors has found its way in¬ 
to legitimate commercial channels, with in¬ 
creased sale of both necessaries and luxuries 
to many families, formerly deprived of both.” 

(8) James Acton, President of the Acton 
Publishing Co. 

“Trade in children’s shoes on the first 
Saturday following the enforcement of the 
Act was larger than on any Saturday before 
Christmas, which is considered the best day 
for trade in children’s shoes in the year.” 

(9) H. C. Hocken, Editor and Manager of 
the Sentinel. 

“Public drunkenness has very nearly 
disappeared.” 

(10) Thos. J. Howard, Managing Di¬ 
rector of the Newcombe Piano Co. Ltd. 

“I really don’t think the English language 
supplies me with good enough words to use 
as to its beneficial qualities, not only in 
regard to trade, but in the moral uplift of 
the people in general.” 

F. J. Snith of F. J. Snith & Co. 

“It has blotted out an enormous amount 
of sorrow and trouble.” 

(12) A. Henderson, Manager of the Na¬ 
tional Drug & Chemical Co. 

“Although I did not in any way assist in 
the obtaining of prohibition for this city, 
and was, in fact, rather opposed to the idea, 
my observations of the beneficial effects of 
it in this city has completely converted me 
to become an ardent supporter of the 
movement.” 

W. K. McNaught of the American Watch 
Case Co. of Toronto, Ltd. 

“Although I have always been opposed 
to it, now that it has become law, and we 
have had a trial of it, the effects have been 
so beneficial generally, that I w r ould vote in 
favor of it.” 

The facts and opinions cited herein 
might be multiplied many, many times 
from innumerable quarters, for it is safe to 
say that no reform measure ever adopted in 
Canada has given such general satisfaction 
as has prohibition. 

Episcopal Church View 

The Church of England in Canada, 
or Protestant Episcopal Church, is 


generally considered one of the most 
conservative of the Christian denom¬ 
inations in regard to the temperance 
reform, and, therefore, the consensus 
of opinion of the members of that body 
has perhaps a greater weight. 

An investigation was conducted by 
the Social Service Council of the Church 
of England in Canada as to the exact 
results of the working of prohibition. 
The conclusion reached is set out in an 
official document as follows: 

Prohibition laws in the six provinces that 
have enacted them are working well; but 
the measure of their success is in exact 
ratio to the determination of the authorities 
to enforce them. While Provincial pro¬ 
hibition is good, Dominion prohibition 
would be infinitely better. The benefits 
gained from those laws are almost incal¬ 
culable, and the very thought of going 
back to the old system is out of the question. 
In a word, the Church of England in Can¬ 
ada is solid for prohibition. 

This declaration was unanimously 
adopted at a meeting of the Social 
Service Council held in Ottawa in 
September, 1917. 

Especial attention might be paid to 
the logical implication in one sentence 
of the foregoing statement: “The 
measure of their success is in exact 
ratio to the determination of the 
authorities to enforce them.” If the 
prohibition principle was a vicious and 
unsound one, the more it was enforced 
the worse would be the results. The 
Church of England in Canada could 
not more emphatically endorse the 
principle of prohibition than by assert¬ 
ing that the more efficient the enforce¬ 
ment the more beneficial the results. 

The Views of Prominent Public 

Men 

That honored Canadian, Sir 
William Ilearst, Premier of Ontario 
when the Ontario Temperance Act was 
passed, and to whose honor, patriot- 


Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


249 


ism, moral leadership, and far-sighted 
statesmanship, it will ever stand as a 
monument, has said: 

I am thankful to be able to say that the 
operation of the law has come up to my 
greatest expectations. 

Employers of labor are unanimously of 
the opinion that our people are doing more 
work and better work than ever before. 
. . . A patriotic purpose of the highest 

order has been served. . . . Hotel 

accommodation in Ontario is on the whole 
better than before the Act came into 
force. . . . Official figures indicate a 

large decrease in the number of convictions 
for drunkenness. . . . The Act has 

been instrumental in adding greatly to the 
comfort and happiness of thousands of our 
people. . . . 

During the 1921 campaign in On¬ 
tario to prohibit importation, the then 
Prime Minister, Hon. E. C. Drury, 
said: 

Being a total abstainer and a prohibi¬ 
tionist I want to see the present fight won. 

With the passing of the referendum you 
will have the liquor trade where it will be 
definitely possible to control it. Having 
got it in that shape—having practically 
wiped out the beverage—you will have a 
generation of young people growing up who 
know not the taste of alcoholic liquor. 
You will have trouble while a few of the old 
stagers last, but liquor will be out of busi¬ 
ness as affecting the new generation. 

We are passing through a critical time of 
readjustment. The curtailing of the liq¬ 
uor trade has meant much to the country 
in this period of reconstruction. The 
reason we have money available in the 
province today is that it is not being spent, 
as it might have been, on liquor. 

The Late Judge Archibald, Domin¬ 
ion Parole Officer, Ottawa, said: 

I am satisfied that 95 per cent of all 
serious crime committed in Canada can be 
traced directly or indirectly to liquor habits 
which stimulate or provide the means to 
accomplish the end. There is no habit in 
human life so debasing and so humiliating 


to the intellectual, moral, spiritual, and 
physical development of man as that which 
is produced by the drink habit. 

Prof. James Gibson Hume, head 
of the Department of Philosophy of 
the University of Toronto, said: 

It is admitted that it is in the possession 
of mental and moral powers that man is 
raised above other animals. It is well 
known that the physiological basis of man’s 
mental and moral powers is in the brain 
and nervous system. Physiological and 
psychological experiments have proved 
that the use of narcotics and intoxicants 
tends to dull, deaden, and destroy the 
delicate structures of the brain and nervous 
system, and thus leads to deterioration in 
the individual and degeneration in his 
progeny. The man, then, who indulges in 
intoxicants or narcotics to gratify his 
appetite is committing a species of suicide. 
It is well known that to the degree that a 
man comes under the influence of intoxi¬ 
cants or narcotics he becomes less capable 
of responsible actions. He tends to be¬ 
come a danger to himself, a menace to 
others. Surely education and legislation 
should cooperate in every way to lessen the 
evil of indulgence in narcotics and intoxi¬ 
cants. 

Sir Geo. E. Foster, Canadian rep¬ 
resentative on the League of Nations, 
said: 

Society is only possible by compacts 
which restrain private and personal likes 
and tendencies for the common good, and 
the history of world progress is one con¬ 
tinued application of this truth which calls 
for self-restriction and denial in compara¬ 
tively unimportant matters for the aggre¬ 
gate human benefit. 

I have never known child, woman or man, 
whose mental or moral values were aug¬ 
mented by the indulgence in alcoholic bev¬ 
erages, or the provision of the facilities for 
gratifying it. I have known and observed 
and read of multitudes of children and 
women and men whose lives have been 
saddened and burdened and wrecked be¬ 
cause of this indulgence and the facilities 
provided therefore. 


25 0 


The Annals of the American Academy 


I believe it to be the duty of society to 
protect itself from such dire waste and 
destruction of its best elements, even at 
the risk of inconveniencing a considerable 
minority who desire the continued facilities 
so that they may easily procure beverages 
they desire. 

Opinions, however, might be multi¬ 
plied indefinitely. 

Canadians Not Booze Lovers 

The only person who really suffers 
from being deprived of alcoholic bever¬ 
ages is the man who is, more or less, 
a dipsomaniac. It is regrettable that 
there were and are such, and, naturally, 
we must wait till the species becomes 
extinct before we are to enjoy the 
full benefits of prohibition. In the 
meantime if those who simply can¬ 
not, or fancy they cannot, do without 
booze, indulge very freely in home 
brew or swamp whisky, the species 
will certainly become extinct very 
rapidly. 

Our citizens, as a whole, are accept¬ 
ing with equanimity the new order, 
recognizing that, while they may not 
have their own way in this particular 
matter, the community at large is 
benefiting enormously. They are 
ready, therefore, to loyally and un¬ 
selfishly forego their own desires, even 
what they may consider their rights, 
for the common good. Only as men 
do this can civilization advance. 

Crime and Prohibition 

The Dominion criminal statistics 
bear striking testimony to prohibition, 
and the more closely they are scruti¬ 
nized the more evident becomes the 
truth that the measure of good results 
depends upon the strictness of the law 
and the efficiency of enforcement. 

The following table includes all of 
Canada and covers the full twelve 
months which end September 30 in 
each case: 


Dominion Criminal Statistics 


Year 

Convictions 
for Drunk¬ 
enness 

Total 

Convictions 

Percentage of 

Drunkenness 

to Total 

No. 

Index 

No. 

Index 

1912... 

53,271 

100.0 

146,271 

100.0 

36.4 

1913... 

60,975 

114.5 

153,178 

118.2 

35.2 

1914... 

60,067 

112.8 

183,035 

124.9 

32.8 

1915... 

41,161 

77.3 

153,055 

104.5 

26.8 

1916.. . 

32,730 

61.4 

123,791 

84.5 

26.5 

1917.. . 

27,882 

52.3 

114,011 

77.8 

24.4 

1918... 

21,026 

39.5 

123,236 

84.1 

17.1 

1919... 

24,217 

45.5 

130,019 

88.7 

18.6 

1920... 

39,769 

74.7 

162,708 

111.1 

24.4 

1921. . . 

34,362 

64.5 

177,100 

120.9 

19.4 

1922. . . 

25,048 

47.0 

158,339 

108.3 

15.8 


In considering the tables which 
follow, and which give convictions in 
detail by provinces, it should be 
remembered that the population of 
Canada lias increased during this 
period, according to the census of 1911 
and 1921: 


Population of Canadian Provinces 


Province 

1911 

1921 

Prince Edward Island.. .. 

93,728 

88,615 

Nova Scotia. 

492,338 

523,837 

New Brunswick. 

351,889 

387,876 

Ontario. 

2,523,274 

2,933,662 

Quebec. 

2,003,232 

2,361,199 

Manitoba. 

455,614 

610,118 

Saskatchewan. 

492,432 

757,510 

Alberta..•. 

374,663 

588,454 

British Columbia. 

392,480 

524,582 

Total. 

7,179,650 

8,775,853 


The table shown on the following 
page gives the convictions for drunk¬ 
enness and convictions for all offenses 
for each of the provinces of Canada. 
These statistics are for the years 1914 
and 1922: 




































Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


251 


Convictions in the Provinces of Canada 



Drunkenness 

All Offenses 

1914 

1922 

1914 

1922 

Prince Edward Island. 

342 

162 

523 

341 

Nova Scotia. 

3,999 

1,492 

7,397 

4,279 

New Brunswick. 

1,765 

1,088 

3,101 

2,655 

Quebec. 

12,776 

7,103 

34,149 

35,605 

Ontario. 

17,703 

10,063 

65,806 

72,787 

Manitoba. 

6,193 

1,623 

16,334 

11,840 

Saskatchewan. 

2,142 

816 

13,782 

8,504 

Alberta . 

5,710 

1,608 

19,043 

9,200 

British Columbia. 

9,376 

1,081 

22,694 

13,066 

Yukon Territory. 

'61 

12 

224 

62 

All Canada. 

60,607 

25,048 

183,035 

158,339 


A detailed analysis of the figures 
given in the foregoing tables brings 
out even more strikingly the effect of 
prohibition, when we sort out from 
these offenses the ones that are more 
intimately associated with intemper¬ 
ance as in the following table: 



1914 

1922 

Assaults. 

6,491 

2,999 

Cruelty to animals. 

1,858 

554 

Vagrancy. 

Insulting, obscene and pro- 

15,263 

4,530 

fane language. 

753 

286 

Frequenting bawdy houses. . 

4,953 

3,318 

Loose, idle and disorderly. . 

9,065 

5,929 


38,383 

17,612 


On the other hand, for various 
breaches of municipal and provincial 
acts the total number of convictions 
in 1914 was 33,570 and in 1922, 66,657, 
of which latter 29,544 were offenses 
against motor vehicle acts. 

Drink and Drugs 

Official figures regarding drugs, 
moreover, show that, as the liquor 
evil, it fluctuates with the law and, 
instead of prohibition causing an 


increase of the drug evil, that curse is 
more prevalent in the two “wet” 
provinces, British Columbia and 
Quebec, than in the prohibition part of 
Canada. 

The following table shows the im¬ 
portations for the past ten years: 


Year 

Opium 

Cocaine 

Morphine 

1908. 

Lbs. 

88,013 

5,117 

Ozs. 

Ozs. 

1913. 

248 

2,035 

1914. 

4,438 

1,028 

4,487 

1915. 

7,248 

50 

259 • 

1916. 

1,741 

5,381 

15,495 

1917. 

15,423 

7,051 

52,213 

1918. 

12,471 

4,705 

27,520 

1919. 

34,263 

12,333 

30,087 

1920. 

13,626 

6,968 

28,998 

1921. 

2,953 

3,310 

12,124 

1922. 

1,700 

2,952 

8,774 


In 1908 Dominion Parliament passed 
an act to prohibit the importation, 
manufacture, and sale of opium for 
other than medicinal purposes. In 
1916 the United States passed an 
exceedingly drastic law regarding 
habit-forming drugs, which drove drug 
vendors to Canada, and, at the second 
session of the Dominion Parliament in 






































































252 


The Annals of the American Academy 


1919 and at the regular session in 1920, 
stringent regulations were passed re¬ 
garding the importation, exportation 
and traffic in narcotic drugs. 

In regard to convictions for of¬ 
fenses against the Opium and Narcotic 
Drugs Act, Government statistics show 
that the bulk are from the two 
“wet” provinces of British Colum¬ 
bia and Quebec, and are by Chinese, 
as will be seen from the following 
table: 



Chinese 

Others 

Total 

Convic¬ 

tions 

Prince Edward Is- 




land. 

0 

0 

0 

Nova Scotia. 

2 

0 

2 

New Brunswick.. . 

28 

1 

29 

Ontario. 

218 

94 

312 

Manitoba. 

11 

25 

36 

Saskatchewan.... 

115 

55 

170 

Alberta. 

74 

88 

162 

Total in “dry” 




provinces. 

448 

263 

711 

Quebec. 

107 

245 

352 

British Columbia.. 

656 

145 

801 

Total in “wet” 




provinces. 

763 

390 

1,153 


The full force of these figures is 
brought out in the following table: 



Popula¬ 

tion 

Convic¬ 

tions 

Convic¬ 

tions 

Per 

100,000 

Seven “dry” 




provinces. 

5,890,072 

711 

12 

Two “ wet’ ’ 




provinces. 

2,885,781 

1,153 

40 


Less Drunkenness 

With a 32 per cent increase in 
population, there has in eight years 
been an 84 per cent decrease in 
drunkenness in the four cities of the 
province of Manitoba, as will be seen 


from the following figures, which in¬ 
clude convictions for being “drunk” 
and for being “drunk and disorder¬ 
ly”: 


1913. 

5,101 

610 

411 

418 

6,540 

1914. 

4,344 

369 

395 

284 

5,392 

1915. 

3,259 

191 

539 

111 

4,100 

1916. 

1,795 

86 

169 

34 

2,084 

1917. 

1,060 

28 

27 

29 

1,144 

1918. 

824 

26 

21 

11 

882 

1919. 

1,654 

70 

30 

28 

1,782 

1920. 

1,935 

99 

79 

77 

2,190 

1921. 

884 

78 

42 

25 

1,029 


Decrease in 1921 from 1913 was 5,511, or 
84 per cent. 


Evidence From Ontario 

From any and every prohibition 
province in Canada abundant evidence 
could be obtained of the success of 
prohibition, but typical of the effect 
everywhere is the experience of the 
province of Ontario, the largest 
province in Canada. From official 
sources the following information has 
been culled. 

From the Dominion criminal statis¬ 
tics the figures for the province of 
Ontario are separated in the table on 
page 253. 

An analysis of the foregoing table 
comparing 1914, the last full year of 
license, with 1921, the last year for 
which detailed figures have been pub¬ 
lished, shows that the increase is 
largely in offenses unrelated to drink¬ 
ing and drunkenness, such as the 
following: 



1914 

1921 

Increase 

Offenses relating to 




highways. 

4,717 

19,708 

14,909 


While, on the other hand, there has 
been a large decrease in offenses that 
are ordinarily associated with drink, 


























































Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


253 


Year 

Indictable 

Offences 

Drunkenness 

Other 

Summary 

Convictions 

Total 

Convictions 

1912. 

6,448 

12,785 

29,319 

48,552 

1913. 

7,403 

16,236 

35,160 

58,779 

1914. 

8,932 

17,703 

39,171 

65,806 

1915. 

8,934 

12,553 

37,689 

58,887 

1916. 

7,888 

11,728 

30,004 

49,260 

1917. 

6,924 

10,945 

31,710 

49,579 

1918. 

8,313 

7,932 

38,536 

54,781 

1919. 

8,628 

8,498 

36,089 

53,215 

1920. 

8,414 

15,021 

40,028 

63,463 

1921. 

9,145 

14,498 

50,484 

74,127 

1922. 

8,873 

10,063 

53,851 

72,787 


such as are set out in the following 
table: 



1914 

1921 

Assaults. 

1,627 

894 

Cruelty to animals. 

1,172 

319 

Threats and abusive language. 

166 

103 

Trespass. 

1,982 

805 

Vagrancy. 

4,703 

1,289 

Indecent exposure. 

Indecent, obscene, profane lan- 

165 

55 

guage... 

Keeping and frequenting baw- 

385 

183 

dy houses. 

802 

270 

Loose, idle, disorderly. 

6,411 

1,486 

Total. 

17,413 

5,413 


Decrease, 12,000. 


Of course it must be remembered 
that a large section of the province 
being under prohibition through local 
option, there is not as marked a change 
in the figures for the province as a 
whole as is shown in the part of the 
province which was under license. 

The Views of Medical Men 

During serious influenza epidemics 
in Ontario in 1917 and 1918, amongst 
a part of the population, dissatisfaction 
was loudly voiced that intoxicating 
liquor was difficult to obtain as a 
medicine and a preventative. The 


chief officer of health for the province, 
Lieutenant Colonel McCullough, when 
asked his opinion as to the advisability 
of increasing the facilities for securing 
liquor under the circumstances, made 
the following statement: 

Owing to the fact that, by the judicious 
use of several remedies on our therapeutic 
list, we can safely dispense with alcohol in 
the practice of medicines indicates the 
folly of advising it as a “camouflage” for the 
very serious evils that arise from its use as 
a beverage. 

That his opinion of the therapeutic 
value of intoxicants is shared by the 
great majority of the medical profession 
of the province, is demonstrated by the 
answers of over 500 physicians in reply 
to a questionnaire sent out by The 
Pioneer at the time of the Ontario 
Referendum campaign in 1919. They 
have been tabulated as follows: 

Question Answers 

Do you consider that, generally Yes No 
speaking, another thera¬ 
peutic agent could be used 
which would be as effective 

as alcohol?. 376 149 

Do you consider that a total 
abstainer has any advan¬ 
tage over a moderate 
drinker— 

(a) in immunity to disease? 463 77 

(b) in the better chances of 














































254 


The Annals of the American Academy 


recovery in sickness or 
accident?. 463 51 


Is it your opinion that the 
regular use of beer for bev¬ 
erages purpose is— 


(a) conducive to health?. . . . 

29 

472 

(b) harmless?. 

55 

422 

(c) injurious?. 

443 

41 

Is it your opinion that prohi- 



bition, as existing under the 



Ontario Temperance Act, 



has been beneficial to the 



health of your community? 

438 

56 


“Dry” Fall Fairs 

The “Fall Fair” is a recognized 
institution throughout the province of 
Ontario, and in the old days un- 



Yes 

No 

Neut’l 

A. Order. 

. ... 87 

6 

10 

B. Accident. 

... 86 

8 

9 

C. Sobriety. 

.. .. 83 

9 

12 

(3) In your opinion did the people enjoy 

themselves at the 

Fair this 

year 

under 

“dry” conditions 

as much 

as formerly. 

under “ wet.” 

Yes 

No 

Neut’l 


83 

7 

13 


The following table shows the 
amount of chattel mortgages on record 
and undischarged on December 31, 
1913, and 1920; that is, three 
years prior to prohibition and three 
years subsequent to its coming into 
force: 



To Secure 
Existing Debt 

For Future 
Endorsation 

Total 

1913. 

$32,442,616 

$8,485,788 

607,524 

$40,928,404 

13,582,555 

1920. 

12,975,031 


Reduction. 

$19,467,585 

$7,878,264 

$27,345,849 


fortunately these occasions were often 
marred by drunkenness and debauch¬ 
ery. Under prohibition they have 
been established on a firmer footing 
and these great “get together” 
occasions are becoming an increasing 
success. 

During the year 1921 The Pioneer 
sent out a questionnaire to ascertain 
the effect of prohibition on Fall Fairs. 
The result was striking, as will be seen 
from the following questions and 
answers. 

(1) Was the Fall Fair in your place this 
year as great a success as in the years before 
prohibition? 

Yes No Neut’l 

A. Financially. 87 7 9 

B. Attendance. 88 3 12 

C. Exhibitors. 89 3 11 

(2) Were the conditions in your place 
during the Fair as favorable this year as in 
the years before prohibition? 


Profit From Enforcement 

Nor has the administration of the 
Prohibition Act in Ontario cost the 
province a single dollar. On the 
contrary, a substantial profit is shown. 

Hon. W. E. Raney, Attorney- 
General of Ontario, gave the following 
statement of the cost of enforcing the 
Ontario Temperance Act, and the 
revenue derived from fines: 



Revenue 

Expenditure 

1918. 

$213,709.44 
316,087.36 
785,788.99 
663,886.76 

$210,828.58 

235,454.03 

316,055.70 

482,084.28 

1919. 

1920. 

1921. 



In addition, Mr. Raney said that for 
1921 approximately $200,000 worth 
of confiscated liquor was on hand, 







































Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


255 


making a total revenue in 1921 of 
approximately $863. 

Science Speaks 

Today scientific facts reinforce 
moral persuasion in the movement 
against alcoholism in Canada. Early 
opposition to the temperance crusades 
was quite unscientific in its attitude. 
There are men living today who Jell 
of having been refused in the early days 
by life insurance companies because as 
total abstainers they were considered 
abnormal. Contrast that with the 
fact that the scientific temperance 
text-book authorized for use in the 
public schools of Ontario contains the 
following tables of actuarial statistics 
showing the greater longevity of 
abstainers: 


Years of Expected Life 


Age 

Healthy 

Males 

Temperance 

Males 

Greater Av¬ 
erage Life of 
Abstainers 

20.... 

41.56 

46.95 

12.97% 

25.... 

37.90 

42.97 

13.38% 

35.... 

30.52 

34.59 

13.23% 

45.... 

23.29 

26.10 

12.06% 

55 .... 

16.46 

18.13 

10.14% 

60.... 

13.33 

14.55 

9.15% 


The text-book says: “The above is 
not a comparison of abstainers’ lives 
with those of non-abstainers’ but of 
abstainers’ lives with the standards 
for well-selected lives, generally, which 
were not classified.” 

Toronto Prospers 

When the Ontario Temperance Act 
came into force in the province of 
Ontario, including the city of Toronto, 
that metropolis was the largest city in 
the world under prohibition. It is 
now the largest “dry” city in Canada. 
The effect of prohibition upon the 
business, social, educational, moral 


conditions in Toronto, have, therefore, 
been more fully and severely tried out 
than in any other Canadian commun¬ 
ity. The figures given hereinunder 
are official and no explanation can be 
accepted regarding them that' does 
not take account of prohibition as an 
important factor. Again they are 
typical of urban Canada under pro¬ 
hibition. 

Not only has the city of Toronto 
grown in population and extent, but 
the value of property has enormously 
increased, as will be shown by the 
following table, which gives the pop¬ 
ulation and assessment each year for 
twelve years: 



Population 

Assessment 

1912. 

417,250 

$343,598,145 

1913. 

445,575 

436,120,049 

1914. 

470,144 

513,366,151 

1915. 

463,705 

565,132,579 

1916. 

460,526 

581,951,013 

1917. 

473,829 

589,168,086 

1918. 

489,681 

605,727,725 

1919. 

499,278 

621,051,064 

1920. 

512,812 

639,678,791 

1921. 

522,666 

696,535,003 

1922. 

529,083 

775,578,488 

1923. 


823,367,569 


This increase in the value of prop¬ 
erty is due more largely to the 
increase in business than probably 
to any other factor, and the best 
index to this is found in the bank 
clearing-house figures, which are a 
fair guide to the business turnover 
of the commercial institutions of the 
city. 

During practically the same period 
of time, the deposits carried by 
the banks have greatly increased. 
Even the savings of the school chil¬ 
dren in the Penny Banks, established 
under the auspices of the Board of 
Education, have nearly trebled. This 
is as set out in the following table: 


































256 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Year 

Bank Clearings 

Penny Bank 

1912. 

$2,170,230,376 

2,181,271,577 


1913. 

$156,500 

1914. ...... 

2,012,955,665 

150,500 

1915. 

1,885,956,257 

165,000 

1916. 

2,571,535,612 

190,000 

1917. 

3,004,785,565 

217,500 

1918. 

3,379,864,506 

245,000 

1919. 

4,251,644,303 

320,000 

1920. 

5,410,214,802 

405,000 

1921. 

5,104,893,667 

430,000 


In 1922, 10,814 building permits 
were issued for 13,906 new buildings, 
valued at $35,237,921. 


Gasoline and Booze 

Another index of prosperity is shown 
by the following figures: 


Statement of Cars Registered in 
Ontario 1911-1921 


Year 

Passenger 

Cars 

Trucks 

Total 

1911. 

11,339 



1912. 

16,266 



1913. 

23,700 



1914. 

31,724 



1915. 

42,346 



1916. 

51,326 

2,618 

53,944 

1917. 

78,861 

4,929 

83,790 

1918. 

101,845 

7,529 

109,374 

1919. 

127,860 

11,428 

139,288 

1920. 

155,861 

16,204 

172,065 

1921. 

181,978 

19,554 

201,532 

1922. 

210,333 

24,164 

234,497 


Cars Registered in Toronto 1916-1921 


Year 

Passenger 

Cars 

Trucks 

Total 

1916 .... 

9,994 

1,169 

11,163 

1917. 

14,751 

2,461 

17,212 

1918. 

17,171 

3,168 

20,339 

1919. 

21,747 

4,390 

26,137 

1920 .... 

26,798 

5,536 

32,334 

1921. 

32,063 

6,187 

38,250 

1922. 

37,024 

7,384 

44,588 


In 1922 there was a motor vehicle for 
every twelve persons in Toronto. An 
exceedingly interesting side light on 
the effect of prohibition is shown by 
the following facts: 

Motor Vehicles in Toronto 


1914. 6,662 (estimated) 

1921. 38,250 

• Street Car Passengers Carried 

1914. 163,000,000 

1921. 238,000,000 

Accidental Deaths 

1914. 292 

1921. 121 


If intoxicants were freely sold in 
Toronto, with the congestion of traffic, 
and the increase in the movement of 
the population, accidental deaths 
would have been enormously increased. 
Booze and gasoline are a dangerous 
mixture. Indeed, with the tremendous 
speed at which we are living and 
moving these days, to add to the con¬ 
fusion and danger the factor of the sale 
of liquor would be a crime against 
civilization. 

Reductio Ad Absurdum 

“You cannot enforce the law” say some. 
“The Ontario Temperance Act is such a 
tyrannical measure and so out of harmony 
with public opinion that the people at 
large will not respect or obey it. The 
Government cannot enforce it, and to have 
upon the statute books a law that people 
flagrantly violate, and that cannot be en¬ 
forced, tends to bring discredit upon all law. 
The Ontario Temperance Act should there¬ 
fore be modified or repealed, or in some way 
adapted to the will of the people. It 
should be made enforceable.” 

Proof of the extensive violation of 
the law is easily obtained. In the 
city of Toronto in 1922, there were 
1,372 convictions for breach of the 
Ontario Temperance Act. 

But let us apply this argument in 










































































Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


257 


another direction. If it is a sound one, 
it will hold. In 1922 there were 13,806 
convictions for breach of the Motor 
Vehicles Act. By a parity of reason, 
that Act should be modified or re¬ 
pealed. It is ten times more out of 
harmony with public opinion, ten 
times more difficult of enforcement, it 
brings ten times more discredit upon 
the law, and it is a ten times greater 
factor in bringing about a state of 
anarchy and lawlessness in the com¬ 
munity. There is ten times more force 
to an argument for the repeal or modi¬ 
fication of the Motor Vehicles Act 
than of the Ontario Temperance 
Act. 

What would be said of the man, who, 
because of this violation of the Motor 
Vehicles Act, would advocate the 
raising of the speed limit for motor 
vehicles in the cities of the province 
from twenty to twenty-five, or thirty, 
or forty, or fifty miles per hour? At 
such a figure, few would violate the 
law, for a “Ford” cannot travel that 
fast. 

Both these measures are in a sense 
public safety measures. The higher 
the speed limit, the less the margin of 
safety. The greater the facilities for 
obtaining booze, the less the margin of 
safety. 

The Motor Vehicles Act and the 
Ontario Temperance Act are both 
sane, practical, effective, public safety 
measures, and should be retained and 
strengthened. 

Social Work Helped 

A favorite argument of the anti-pro- 
hibitionist of the last generation was: 
“You cannot make a man good by 
law.” This argument is being an¬ 
swered today by thousands of social 
service agencies who are at work on 
the principle that the sane way of deal¬ 
ing with social evils of all kinds is to 
legislate to remove their cause, rather 


than to simply warn or win men away 
from them. 

The Neighborhood Worker’s Asso¬ 
ciation of Toronto is a clearing house 
for the many social service and relief 
agencies of the city. The report of 
their executive quotes the experience of 
a great number of the various affiliated 
organizations, testifying to the notable 
diminution of the need for their chari¬ 
table sendees as a result of prohibition 
conditions. 

From the last annual report the fol¬ 
lowing statement is taken. Year end¬ 
ing April 30 in each of the following 
years: 

1919- Of 773 cases, 9 due to intemperance 

1920- Of 1408 cases, 18 due to intemperance 

1921- Of 2306 cases, 20 due to intemperance 

1922- Of 4507 cases, 37 due to intemperance 

Ordinarily the bulk of such cases 
would be due to alcoholism in some 
form. 

Indeed, the talented general sec¬ 
retary of that organization recently 
said that today intoxication is prac¬ 
tically a negligible quantity in connec¬ 
tion with their relief work. Mortality 
has been reduced by prohibition. 

Deaths from Alcoholism in Toronto 


1911...34 

1917. 

..19 

1912...51 

1918. 

.. 9 

1913...45 

1919. 

.. 9 

1914...31 

1920. 

. .15 

1915...22 

1921. 

. .11 

1916...19 




In Toronto the death rate of 11.2 
per 1,000 of 1921 was the lowest on 
record. In infant mortality there was 
also similar improvement, 86.85 per 
thousand as compared to 144.4 in 1911. 

Pleasure and Prohibition 

A feature of the intensive develop¬ 
ment of the city is seen in the parks 
department. This is shown by the 
following tables: 


18 



The Annals of the American Academy 


258 


Parks and Playgrounds 


Year 

Acres 

Park Area 

No. OF 
Playgrounds 

1912. 

1,743.07 


1913. 

1,858.79 

• • • 

1914. 

1,858.79 

... 

1915. 

1,861.94 

296 

1916. 

1,861.94 

249 

1917. 

1,868.75 

241 

1918. 

1,868.75 

259 

1919. 

1,869.61 

346 

1920. 

1,872.92 

363 

1921. 

1,872.92 

397 


In 1922 there were 150 more improved 
playgrounds than in 1914, and that 
they are appreciated is evident to all. 
Din connection with public parks 


there are: 

Equipped playgrounds. 33 

Baseball fields. 52 

Cricket fields.’.. 8 

Football fields. 36 

Tenn is courts. 175 

Bowling greens. 14 

Quoiting grounds. 2 

Croquet grounds. 2 

Lacrosse fields. 3 

Skating rinks. 52 

Hockey rinks. .. 49 

Toboggan slides. 2 

Miniature slides. 12 

Bathing stations. 2 

Curling rinks. 2 

Total. 444 


The Toronto Amateur Baseball Associa¬ 
tion alone has over six thousand young 
men and boys enrolled in over three 
hundred teams. They use the city 
parks and playgrounds. 

Every night visitors to the city parks 
and playgrounds will find them crowded 
with citizens enjoying themselves, 
participating in sports, or spectators 
in the various athletic contests that 
are going on. Never in all history has 
there been such an era of good, clean, 
wholesome, whole-hearted sport free 
from nastiness, which only too often 


graced athletic games in the old license 
days. 

Social Amenities 

If drinking had been driven into the 
home, as some fearful and some un¬ 
scrupulous people said it would be, such 
a change would show itself in home 
conditions. As a matter of fact, in 
the old days it was the man who was 
primed in the bar that took the bottle 
home. Now they are not primed and 
stay dry. Indeed, everything points 
to a substantial change for the better 
in home conditions. 

This is reflected both in the business 
and school statistics, and incidentally 
by the fact that in 1914 there were 311 
cases in the Toronto police court of 
neglected children and in 1921, 121. 

With the passing of the bars, there 
has been a growth in the number and 
membership of fraternal and social 
organizations, as will be seen from the 
following table, which gives some of 
the main societies: 


Year 

Masonic 

Odd Fellows 

Orange 

Associations 

Trades and 
Labor 

Clubs 

1912.... 

39 

39 

107 

106 

103 

1913.. . . 

41 

43 

110 

99 

104 

1914... . 

41 

46 

128 

98 

109 

1915.... 

44 

67 

133 

125 

119 

1916.. . . 

51 

70 

136 

120 

130 

1917... . 

51 

70 

141 

120 

130 

1918.. . . 

53 

72 

137 

119 

133 

1919... . 

54 

72 

137 

114 

136 

1920.. . . 

58 

75 

137 

140 

145 

1921... . 

65 

75 

137 

140 * 

144 

1922.. . . 

75 

76 

146 

146 

163 


Hotel Accommodation 

Instead of prohibition hurting the 
hotel accommodation in the city of 
Toronto, it has been greatly improved 
and increased. For example, on the 
corner of Leader Lane and King Street 




















































Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


259 


was the Leader Hotel, which was 
practically a saloon. This with a 
number of other buildings has been 
used as a site for the new addition to 
the King Edward Hotel, which ad¬ 
dition alone supplies, in the aggregate, 
more accommodation than one hun¬ 
dred hotels which lost their licenses. 

But the smaller hotels have not all 
gone out of business. Some of them 
are still carrying on and others of the 
larger ones have also been improved 
and extended. As a matter of fact, 
of the 160 premises formerly under 
license, there are only two properties 
vacant today. 

Substitutes for the Saloon 

But where have the patrons of the 
old bars gone? What do they do? A 
census was taken of the Toronto bars 
on one occasion, and from the figures 
gleaned it was estimated that approx¬ 
imately 30,000 men patronized Toronto 
bars on the average evening. Where 
are these bar patrons now? What 
substitute they have found for the 
saloon may be answered in various 
ways. 

Take one illustration, the St. Charles 
bar, corner Bay and Richmond Streets. 
In license days the writer has counted 
128 men, mostly young, many notice¬ 
ably inebriated, at one time in the 
evening. 

For a while this bar was kept run¬ 
ning as a soft drink bar. The bar was 
there, the mirror and glasses and 
decorations and lights remained. The 
same proprietor and bar tenders, with 
their white aprons, were ready to 
serve customers. Drinks of almost 
endless variety were on tap to ally the 
most parched throat. The only thing 
changed by prohibition was the per¬ 
centage of alcohol in the beverages 
supplied. The law only prohibited 
drinks that would make a man drunk. 

After prohibition the writer has 


visited the same bar, at the same 
hour, and found four men sipping 
near-beer and butter-milk. The 
balance had found their own sub¬ 
stitute for the bar. Indeed, obviously, 
it was not the bar or companionship 
that brought them there. It was booze. 
That removed, the bar had no at¬ 
traction. Booze does not need a 
substitute, other than wholesome liv¬ 
ing. 

But the great substitute that had been 
found for the drink bar is the home. 
Men are getting acquainted with and 
interested in their homes, and are 
finding it immensely enjoyable and 
helpful. The barroom preyed upon 
the home. The home has now come 
into its own. Its interests are supreme. 

Mr. Ralph Conable has said: 

I have before me the daily and weekly 
receipts at the three largest Movie Houses 
of Toronto, covering a long period 1916 and 
1917, and note their receipts are almost 
exactly three times as much this year as 
last. 

Figures before quoted show that 
there are three or four hundred more 
fraternal and social organizations in 
the city. One has but to go to our 
parks, rinks, and places of amusement 
to see them thronging not with men 
only, but, men who formerly frequented 
the bars, are accompanied by their 
wives and families. 

Toronto Police Figures 

A study of the Annual Reports of 
the Chief Constable of the city of 
Toronto for a term of years brings out 
further striking testimony to the 
benefits of prohibition, and the more 
closely they are scrutinized, the more 
evident becomes the truth that drink¬ 
ing and drunkenness, with all their 
concomitant evils, are in proportion to 
the legal facilities afforded for the 
obtaining of intoxicating beverages. 


260 


The Annals of the American Academy 


As facilities are reduced, drinking 
and drunkenness are correspondingly 
lessened. As these facilities are ex¬ 
tended, drinking and drunkenness 
correspondingly increase. 

The ills that come to mankind from 
the consumption of intoxicating liquors 
cannot be cured by providing means 
by which men may obtain intoxicants, 
any more than we can hope to cure a 
disease by providing for the distribu¬ 
tion of its germs. 

Further, the police reports bring out 
the fact that prohibition showed itself 
in the immediate reduction of crime. 
The total police cases for the three 
months preceding September, for Sep¬ 
tember, and for the three months fol¬ 
lowing September, 1916, were as fol¬ 


lows: 

June. 3,028 Wet 

July. 3,037 Wet 

August. 3,307 Wet 

September. 2,871 Half and half 


October. 1,972 Dry 

November. 1,940 Dry 

December. 1,771 Dry 

or an average for the three months 
preceding prohibition of 3,124, and for 
the three months after prohibition of 
1,894. 

Take another illustration of the 
immediate results from prohibition. 
It is found in the Toronto police figures 
of arrests for drunkenness. These 
were as follows: 

September 16 to December 31,1915. 3,347 

September 16 to December 31,1916. 1,022 

Reduction. 2,325 

But it was not only in drunkenness 
that the effect is seen, but in the figures 
for all offenses, as set forth in the 
following table, which not only gives 
the total number of cases handled by 
the police, but some of the major 
offenses and those related to intemper¬ 
ance : 


Statistical Report of Cases Dealt with by Toronto Police 



1914 

1915 

1916 

1917 

1918 

1919 

1920 

1921 

1922 

Total cases. 

39,816 

36,480 

9,993 

25,714 

28,206 

30,170 

36,804 

38,278 

45,614 

Assaults. 

601 

488 

474 

426 

536 

520 

493 

518 

422 

Burglary, house and shop break¬ 
ing . 

374 

338 

312 

331 

409 

655 

566 

560 

407 

Breach of Truancy Act. 

57 

41 

92 

207 

267 

283 

67 

94 

170 

Breach of Motor Vehicles Act. . 

1,851 

3,444 

3,312 

33,801 

5,599 

8,148 

8,965 

9,009 

13,806 

Breach of Gaming Act. 

204 

206 

573 

805 

1,187 

1,666 

1,071 

770 

1,441 

Breach of Lord’s Day Act. 

802 

534 

398 

316 

284 

366 

284 

360 

457 

Breach of City By-Law. 

8,424 

7,962 

6,333 

6,025 

6,050 

5,384 

9,813 

12,290 

15,977 

Cruelty to animals. 

1,074 

1,150 

944 

586 

463 

324 

211 

167 

183 

Disorderly. 

2,734 

2,429 

1,435 

1,018 

1,101 

1,049 

1,031 

1,084 

985 

Drunk. 

14,247 

11,232 

9,639 

4,554 

3,433 

3,925 

6,130 

4,727 

4,059 

Fraud. 

513 

420 

284 

243 

266 

320 

352 

542 

397 

Inmates or frequenters disorderly 
houses and houses of ill fame. 

508 

798 

583 

496 

342 

359 

266 

261 

403 

Murder and manslaughter. 

26 

14 

15 

18 

30 

25 

31 

36 

20 

Neglecting to maintain family.. 

124 

109 

119 

111 

120 

161 

170 

230 

318 

Neglecting children. 

311 

178 

125 

136 

175 

225 

96 

128 

121 

Trespass. 

1,222 

872 

318 

372 

575 

470 

391 

461 

453 

Theft. 

2,319 

2,174 

1,687 

1,890 

2,154 

2,018 

2,211 

2,152 

1,794 

Vagrancy. 

2,105 

1,625 

1,081 

1,238 

901 

807 

991 

1,053 

731 

Insanity. 

130 

128 

110 

106 

82 

54 

98 

74 

70 

Accidental deaths. 

292 

241 

237 

257 

247 

243 

178 

121 

272 


















































Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


261 


If we compare the year 1914 with 
1922, it will be seen that there is an 
increase in the total number of cases 
from 39,816 to 45,614, an increase of 
5,798. But, if we look to see what 
important items make up this increase, 
we will find that breaches of the On¬ 
tario Motor Vehicles Act increased 
from 1,851 to 13,806, and breaches of 
City By-Laws increased from 8,424 to 
15,977; or in these two items alone we 
have an increase of 19,508, which 
means a decrease in all other offenses 
of 13,710 cases. 

On the other hand, if we take the 
offenses closely related to intemperance, 
we will find them as set out in the 
following table: 


Assaults. 

601 

422 

Cruelty to animals. 

1,074 

183 

Disorderly. 

2,734 

985 

Drunk. 

14,247 

4,059 

Neglect of children. 

311 

121 

Trespass. 

1,222 

453 

Vagrancy. 

2,015 

731 

Insanity. 

130 

70 

Total. 

22,334 

7,024 


Decrease, 15,310 


During this time there was an in¬ 
crease in population from 470,144 to 
529,083, or 58,939. 

It may be that prohibition is responsi¬ 
ble for the increased number of offenses 
against the Motor Vehicles Act, be¬ 
cause of the fact that the number of 
motor vehicles has increased from 
6,663 in 1914 to 44,500 in 1922. Cer¬ 
tain it is that people are buying and 
driving motor vehicles today who 
never could have afforded to do so but 
for prohibition. 

A closer scrutiny brings out still 
more clearly the fact that drinking and 
drunkenness with their concomitant 
evils fluctuate with the severity of the 
law. That is, the more strict the 
legislation the better the results. The 


easier it is made for men to keep sober 
and the harder to get drunk, the more 
there are who keep sober, the fewer 
there are who get drunk. 

Drunkenness and the Law 

During the years from which figures 
have been given above, there have 
been varying laws in force in the city 
of Toronto. 

These may be set forth as follows: 

1914— Before the war the liquor traffic 
was in full blast; 110 bars and 50 shops 
were operating in the city of Toronto. 

1915— Hours of sale restricted, closing 
hour being put at 8 p.m. instead of 11 p.m. 

1916— Ontario Temperance Act came 
into force on September 17. Thus there 
was 8^ months of license and 3| months of 
Provincial prohibition. 

1917— Ontario Temperance Act in force 
for the entire 12 months, and has been in 
force continuously ever since. 

1918— Dominion war-time prohibition of 
manufacture, importation, and inter¬ 
provincial shipment came into force in 
March, supplementing the Ontario Tem¬ 
perance Act for remaining nine months in 
the year. 

1919— The year of demobilization. The 
Ontario Temperance Act and Dominion 
war-time prohibition both in force for the 
entire 12 months. But 25,000 adults added 
to the population during the year by return 
of the men from the front. 

1920— Dominion prohibition repealed 
effective January. Distilleries and brew¬ 
eries reopened, importation and inter- 
provincial shipments permitted. 

1921— Dominion measure prohibiting 
importation July, 1917, as a result of a vote 
taken in April. With it a Provincial 
measure (The Sandy Bill) prohibiting the 
transportation, delivery or receiving of 
liquor within the province, for sale or 
consumption within the province. 

These supplemented the Ontario Temper¬ 
ance Act for 5§ months. 

1922— Ontario Temperance Act plus 
measures prohibiting importation, trans¬ 
portation, delivery or receiving of liquor in 
force for entire 12 months. 


















262 


The Annals of the American Academy 


During this period the population of 
Toronto also greatly increased. The 
following diagram gives cases of drunk¬ 
enness per 10,000 of the population 
each year, from 1914 to 1922 inclusive: 


in any economic, social or moral im¬ 
provement that would immediately 
manifest itself; but the supreme gain 
would be that the rising generation, 
growing up without the alcoholic taint 


(Note how the curve of drinking and drunkenness follows the curve of 
restrictive legislation up and down.) 


/f/ 



/J/S 


Prohibition Lessens Drunkenness. 

T&soyvra 



How could anything prove more positively than do these figures that the tighter the law, the 
less drunkenness; the looser the law, the more drunkenness? What utter foolishness it is to hope 
to cure the ills that arise from the use of alcoholic liquors by providing facilities by which people 
may get such liquors to use. 


Crowning Glory of Prohibition 

The most impressive and far-reaching 
effect of prohibition is probably re¬ 
vealed by the school statistics. Pro¬ 
hibitionists have always contended that 
the greatest benefit from the elimin¬ 
ating of the liquor traffic would not be 
the increased profits through the 
larger business done by the merchants, 
because the money spent for liquor was 
diverted to other uses; nor the greater 
increase in production by the workers, 
because of their increased efficiency, 
greater punctuality and regularity at 
work, and less breakage and damage 
caused by carelessness, though these 
are all evident and pronounced; nor 


in their blood, and without the tempta¬ 
tion to dissipation in their environment, 
would be cleaner, purer, stronger, 
finer and fitter in every way. And 
after all what really matters, except 
the effect upon the quality of human 
life of any proposition? This is the 
supreme test. Does it mean better 
humans? Does it fit for citizenship? 
Citizens in the making are in our 
schools. 

If we take the official figures of the 
Board of Education for the city of 
Toronto, and make a comparison of the 
year 1914 with the year 1922, which is 
perhaps the fairest that could be made, 
we arrive at the following results: 











Prohibition Legislation in Canada 


263 



1914 

1922 

Population. 

470,144 

78,897 

168 

47,860 

102 

60.7% 

529,083 

100,693 

190 

74,487 

141 

74% 

Total registration, primary schools. 

Total registration per thousand of population. 

Total attendance, primary schools. 

Total attendance per thousand of population. 

Percentage attendance to registration. 



Some of the implications of these 
facts deserve special emphasis. These 
figures demonstrate conclusively that 
the homes of Toronto have been in¬ 
calculably blessed by prohibition. 
This is reflected in the children from 
those homes, who, better nurtured, 
better fed, better clad, happier, health¬ 
ier, are not only attending school in 
larger numbers but more regularly. 
They come from better homes. 

It will be seen that, although regis¬ 
tration per thousand of the population 
increased by 13 per cent, non-attendance 
of registered scholars decreased 26 per 
cent, and attendance increased 37.5 per 
cent. This reveals an improvement 


with their meagre earnings, home in¬ 
come that is wasted for booze. Their 
stomachs are satisfied, and they can 
apply themselves with comfort and 
attention to studies. 

Helps Higher Education 

Even more striking are the figures 
regarding secondary education. The 
children have not been compelled to 
leave school so soon, but have gone on 
to collegiates, technical schools, and 
schools of commerce, so that the 
combined attendance in these second¬ 
ary schools has increased 124 per 
cent, as will be seen by the following 
figures: 


Total attendance, high schools, day. 

4,390 

10,532 

Attendance per thousand of population. 

10 

20 

Total attendance, high school, night. 

3,479 

9,594 

Attendance per thousand of population. 

7 

18 

Aggregate attendance, all high schools. 

7,869 

20,126 

Aggregate attendance per thousand of population. 

17 

38 


in the home life of the community that 
cannot be estimated or set down in 
figures. 

The children now have shoes and 
clothing with which to go to school. 
They are not neglected nor running the 
streets. They are not compelled to 
go to work in effort to supplement, 


Worthy of note is the large increase 
of attendance in the day schools, and 
slight decrease in night schools. Many 
scholars are not now compelled to work 
during the day and study at night. 

When we combine the foregoing 
figures the result is positively startling, 
as will be seen by the following: 


Gross attendance, primary and high schools. 
Gross attendance, per thousand of population 


55,129 

118 


94,613 

179 


































264 


The Annals of the American Academy 


From 1914 to 1922 the increase in 
the average attendance of all city 
schools, public and high, per thousand 
of the population, was 52 per cent. 

The effect of this upon higher 
citizenship and better condition of life 
is calculable. Prohibition means bet¬ 
ter men and women, physically, men¬ 
tally, morally. 

The increased attendance has brought 
about almost a crisis in the educa¬ 
tional affairs of the city. School taxes 
have enormously increased; the attend¬ 
ance has entirely outrun the ac¬ 
commodation available, so that in 
some schools the children have to 
attend in relays. Yet there are act¬ 
ually some citizens who grudge the 
expenditure and grumble about the 
additional expense entailed. 

Corroborative Testimony 

Toronto is not singular in this re¬ 
gard. That the figures given are 
typical of the province at large is 
attested by the result of a questionnaire 
sent out by Mr. James Hales, K.C., 
chairman of the Board of License 
Commissioners for Ontario, to the 
school inspectors of the province, and 
published in the Annual Report of the 
Commission from which the following 
is taken: 

1. Has the Ontario Temperance Act 
made an appreciable improvement in school 
attendance? 99 or 76 per cent answered 
“Yes,” and 30 or 23 answered “No.” 

(Note: Some of those who answered 
“No” say that they previously had pro¬ 
hibition under local option, so the change 
was not noticeable.) 

2. Has it improved the home surround¬ 
ings of the children? 158 or 94 per cent 
answered “Yes,” and 10 or 5 per cent 
answered “No.” 

3. Has it improved their opportunities 


for obtaining an education? 159 or 95 per 
cent answered “Yes,” and 10 or 5 per cent 
answered “No.” 

4. Has it resulted in their better educa¬ 
tion? 147 or 93 per cent answered “Yes,” 
and 10 or 6 per cent answered “No.” 

A fact based upon these figures may 
be emphasized. It is that, in any 
given class, the more regular the 
attendance, the better the results 
from the whole class, as well as added 
benefits to the individual scholars who 
attend more regularly. In 1914 the 
proportion of attendance to registra¬ 
tion in the primary schools was 60.7 
per cent; in 1922 it was 74 per cent. 

Prohibition has helped, and, as there 
is real concern upon the part of men 
and women of this generation for the 
highest welfare of those who shall 
follow us, and whose way we are to 
prepare, there should be earnest effort 
to strengthen and stabilize our pro¬ 
hibition laws. 

Conclusion 

No amount of sophistry, academic 
argument, specious reasoning, appeal 
to prejudice, can offset the facts herein 
set out. Through all the dust of 
discussion as to principles, controversy 
as to methods, distorted imaginings of 
possible cataclysmic calamities, this 
great fact stands boldly out: 'prohi¬ 
bition works. Galling as it may be to 
some people, foolish as it may seem to 
others, it does good. Pipe about its 
impracticability, storm at its tyranny, 
it pays, financially, socially, politically, 
educationally, morally. In these days 
it is results that count. 

Prohibition is making this Canada 
of ours a better land to live in, and 
making the people who live in it 
better citizens. 


The English Law Relating to the Sale of 
Intoxicating Liquors 

By Lady Astor 


O UR Saxon forefathers had many 
virtues, but these did not in¬ 
clude temperance in relation to in¬ 
toxicating liquor. In pre-Christian 
days the ideal to which they looked 
beyond the grave was the pleasure of 
drinking mead—that is the drink 
consisting of fermented honey and 
sugar—in the skulls of their foes. 

We know of no legislative inter¬ 
ference with or restriction on the free 
sale of intoxicating liquor in England 
until the reign of King Henry VII. 
Excise taxes—that is taxes on com¬ 
modities produced and consumed in 
the country—had of course been levied 
long before that period, but the only 
legislative or administrative provisions 
of which we have any record were 
directed to securing that the liquor 
sold should be of “good quality.” 
Ale testers were appointed for this 
purpose. They regulated the price 
and took proceedings before the next 
sitting of the Court Leet,—that is, 
the local manorial court—against any 
brewers or others who supplied ale or 
beer of inferior quality, according to 
the judgment of the ale tester. 

Early Licensing Laws 

We can trace the origin of the 
present English licensing system to 
“An Act against Vagabonds and 
Beggars” passed in the eleventh year 
of the reign of Henry VII. Amongst 
other things that Act provided that 

It shall be lawful for two Justices of the 
Peace to reject and put away common ale 
selling in towns and places where they 
shall think convenient, and to take surety 
of the keepers for their good behavior by 


the discretion of the said Justices and in the 
same to be advised and agreed at the time 
of their Sessions. 

Half a century or so later, a further 
Act was passed—in the reign of 
Edward VI—confirming and extend¬ 
ing the Act of 1495. The Act was 
entitled “An Act for Keepers of Ale¬ 
houses to be bound by Recognizances. ” 
It is worth quoting the introduction to 
this Act. It runs as follows: 

For inasmuch as intolerable hurts and 
troubles to the Commonwealth of this 
Realm do daily grow and increase through 
such abuses and disorders as are had and 
used in common alehouses and other houses 
called tippling houses, the Justices are 
hereby empowered to put away common 
ale selling, and after May 1,1552, no person 
may keep an alehouse without their 
permission. 

Further, every “admitted” person 
was required to enter into recogniz¬ 
ances for his good behavior, and selling 
ale without permission was to be 
punished by imprisonment. In the 
following year the trade in wine was 
brought under similar control, with 
the additional provision that wine li¬ 
censes were to be limited in number, 
not more than two being granted in 
any town except London, which was 
allowed 40, York 8, Bristol 6, and a 
few other large centers. 

Apparently, these statutes had very 
little effect in restraining the growth 
of drinking and the number of ale¬ 
houses. Thus, we read that even the 
Brewers’ Company—one of the old 
companies of the city of London— 
in 1647 announced that they grieved 
because of the laxity of the magistrates 


265 


266 


The Annals of the American Academy 


in putting down unnecessary alehouses, 
which were only the receptacles of 
drunkards, and that they hoped that 
“consideration of the brutish sin of 
drunkenness w r ould move the hearts 
of the pious magistracy of this time 
to have a more vigilant eye over these 
irregular private houses.” As an ex¬ 
ample of the evil which the worthy 
Brewers’ Company protested against, 
it may be mentioned that in one town 
alone, containing only 200 houses, 140 
were alehouses. 

One may perhaps give one further 
quotation from the preamble of these 
early Acts as showing, not only the 
views of the governing class of that 
time in reference to the sale of in¬ 
toxicating liquors, but also as indicat¬ 
ing the views which have held good, to 
a large extent, right down to the 
present day. The Act referred to was 
passed in the year 1604 to restrain the 
inordinate haunting and tippling in 
inns and alehouses. The preamble of 
that Act defined the legitimate use of 
taverns as follows: 

Whereas the ancient, true and principal 
use of wine, alehouses and victualling 
houses was for the receipt, relief and 
lodging of wayfaring people traveling 
from place to place and for the supply of 
the wants of such people, as are not 
able by greater quantities to make their 
own provision of victuals, and not meant 
for entertainment and harboring of lewd 
and idle people to spend and consume their 
money and time in lewd and drunken 
manner. It is enacted that only travelers 
and travelers’ friends and laborers for one 
hour at dinner time, or lodgers, can receive 
entertainment under penalty. 

It will be well at this stage to give 
the precise legal definition in England 
of intoxicating liquor: 

“Intoxicating liquor” is defined by 
statute as meaning spirits, wine, beer, 
porter, cider, perry, and sweets, and 
any fermented, distilled or spirituous 


liquor which cannot, according to any 
law for the time being in force, be 
legally sold without an excise license. 
The word “sweets” as used in the 
above definition means any liquor 
which is made from fruit and sugar or 
from fruit or sugar mixed with any 
other material, and wdiich has under¬ 
gone a process of fermentation in 
its manufacture. It includes British 
wines, made wines, and mead. 

Parliament Steps In 

Coming down to more modern times, 
the position in the year 1828 was that 
all alehouses w r ere under the immediate 
oversight of the magistrates or justices 
and had been so for nearly three cen¬ 
turies; without their sanction and 
certificate or license, intoxicating liq¬ 
uors could not be sold by retail, neither 
could excise licenses be granted for 
that purpose without the production 
of the magistrates’ certificate. 

The whole question of liquor legis¬ 
lation was by this time in a state of 
chaos, and there is a volume of evidence 
as to the national demoralization 
caused by excessive indulgence in gin 
and other such spirituous liquors. 
Parliament therefore decided to con¬ 
solidate the existing statutes. This 
was effected by the Alehouse Act of 
1828. Two years later an important 
Act was passed which empowered any 
householder, entering into a bond for 
payment of penalties, and without a 
certificate or license from the magis¬ 
trates, to retail beer or cider. This 
Act contained no restriction as to the 
place of consumption. The benevo¬ 
lent purpose of the Act was to wean the 
public from gin and spirit drinking. 

I he result belied these aims! Spirit 
drinking continued, and even in¬ 
creased, and at the same time the 
abolition of the restrictions on beer 
selling led to an enormous increase in 
the consumption of that beverage. 


English Law Relating to Sale of Intoxicating Liquors 


267 


Summary of Nineteenth-Century 
Measures 

The history of the liquor question 
in Great Britain from that date to 
the present time is one long story of 
Parliamentary and other commissions 
sitting and reporting on the subject, 
and of statute after statute being 
enacted with a view to increasing the 
public control of the trade and mit¬ 
igating some of its worst evils. It 
may be useful to give a brief list of the 
more striking or important of these 
Acts with an indication of the purpose 
they had in view: 

1834. The Beer-house Act. This di¬ 
vided the liquor traders into two 
classes, those who sold beer to be 
consumed on the premises and those 
who sold beer to be consumed off 
the premises. 

1854. Sunday Closing of Liquor Prem¬ 
ises in Scotland provided for. 

1860. An Act prohibiting miners’ 
pay offices being contiguous to 
liquor premises. 

1860. An Act permitting grocers and 
other shopkeepers to retail wine in 
bottle to be consumed off the premises. 
1862. An Act stipulating that debts 
for spirits consumed on the premises 
are irrecoverable. This was ex¬ 
tended to debts for malt liquors, 
cider and perry in 1867. 

1872 and 1873. Three Acts prohibit¬ 
ing the payment of workers’ wages 
on liquor premises. 

1872. The Licensing Act of this year 
consolidated the existing law, limited 
the hours of sale of liquor, abolished 
the right of appeal to Quarter 
Sessions against the refusal of the 
Justices in Petty Sessions or “Brews¬ 
ter Sessions” to grant a new license. 
The Act also provided that where 
a new license was granted by the 
Justices it should be confirmed by 
the Court above. 

1881. Sunday closing of public houses 
(■ i.e ., saloons) in Wales made com¬ 
pulsory. 


1882. The sittings of Borough Jus¬ 
tices prohibited on liquor premises. 

1883 and 1884. Acts prohibiting the 
use of public houses and refreshment 
houses as committee rooms for Par¬ 
liamentary and municipal elections. 

1887. Part payment of agricultural 
laborers’ wages in beer or cider was 
prohibited. 

1895. The holding of district councils 
and parish council meetings on 
liquor premises prohibited. 

1901. This Act prohibited the sale to 
children or young persons apparently 
under the age of 16 of any description 
of spirits to be consumed on the 
premise. 

1902. An Act forbidding the holding 
of Petty Sessions in public houses, 
requiring clubs where liquor is 
served to be registered; strength¬ 
ening the law as against drunken¬ 
ness, and considerably extending 
the power of the Justices in con¬ 
nection with the structure of licensed 
premises and various other matters 
affecting liquor licenses. 

1904. The Licensing Act of this year 
restricted the power of the Justices 
to refuse renewal of existing on-li¬ 
censes to certain specified grounds. 
In all other cases they must report to 
Quarter Sessions who could only 
refuse to renew on payment of 
compensation to be provided by the 
“Trade.” As regards new on-li¬ 
censes, the Justices were empowered 
to grant these for a term of years and 
upon payment of an amount of 
money intended to secure the “mo¬ 
nopoly value” of any such new 
license to the public. 

1908. An Act was passed excluding 
children under 14 from the bars of 
public houses and prohibiting the 
giving of alcohol to children under 5. 

1910. The Licensing Act of this year 
repealed the Licensing Acts from 
1828 to 1906 and reproduced them 
in a consolidated form. 

1921. The Licensing Act of this year 
reduced and restricted the hours 
during which liquor may be sold 
on licensed premises and clubs. 


268 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Present State of the Law 

The general position as regards the 
sale of intoxicating liquors at the 
present time may be shortly summed 
up as follows: 

Subject to certain exceptions, re¬ 
ferred to later, no intoxicating liquor 
may be retailed in any premises unless 
those premises have been licensed for 
the purpose by the Justices. Further, 
an excise duty must be paid to the 
Crown in respect of any premises so 
licensed before liquor can lawfully be 
sold thereon. These licenses are re¬ 
newable from time to time, in most 
cases annually. The Justices have 
considerable powers of control, both 
in connection with the management 
and the general conduct of the estab¬ 
lishment, and as regards the structure 
and other conditions. 

The renewal of a license may be 
refused on various grounds, including 
breaches of the conditions on which 
it was supplied, or misconduct on the 
part of the licensee or landlord. 
Where, however, a license is refused 
in the case of premises which were 
licensed before the Act of 1904, on 
grounds other than certain grounds 
definitely prescribed by law, the li¬ 
censee is entitled to compensation at 
the expense of “the Trade” on the 
principles hereafter explained. 

The control by the licensing Justices 
of the issue of new licenses is on a very 
different footing from their control 
with regard to the renewal of licenses, 
particularly those which were in force 
before the year 1904. As regards new 
licenses, they are empowered by statute 
to grant these, in so far as in the exer¬ 
cise of their discretion they deem fit 
and proper. Any person is entitled 
to appear before the Justices and 
oppose the issue of a fresh license. 
The main ground for objecting to a 
new license would be that it is not 


needed, or that there is already a 
sufficiency or even a redundancy of 
public houses in the district for which 
it is proposed a new license should 
be issued. Even here, however, the 
Justices are not altogether free men. 
It has been laid down by the Courts 
that the discretion they have to 
exercise must be “a judicial discretion 
and not a mere capricious act regard¬ 
less of the special circumstances of 
each application. ” 

It may be mentioned here that a 
Justice is disqualified from acting on 
the Bench of Licensing Justices who 
is in partnership with or holds any 
share in any company which is a 
brewer, distiller, maker of malt for 
sale, or retailer of malt, or of any 
intoxicating liquor, in the licensing 
district in which that Justice usually 
acts or in any adjoining district. 

The English Licensing 
Authorities 

The licensing authority for intoxi¬ 
cating liquors in counties are the 
Justices. The county is divided for 
this, and for other purposes connected 
with the administration of the general 
law, into Petty Sessional Divisions. 
Appeals against refusals to renew or 
transfer licenses are heard by the 
Justices in Quarter Sessions, that is, 
the Justices for the county at large. 
New licenses and orders sanctioning 
the removals of licenses from one 
place to another must be confirmed by 
the County Licensing Committee ap¬ 
pointed by the Justices in Quarter 
Sessions. 

In the case of the larger and more 
important boroughs the borough Jus¬ 
tices are the licensing authority, and 
the borough is a licensing district. 
Appeals against the refusals to renew 
and transfer licenses lie to the Quarter 
Sessions of the county as a whole. 

There are certain exceptional cases 


English Law Relating to Sale of Intoxicating Liquors 


269 


where liquor may be sold by retail 
without a Justice’s license, though in 
all cases an excise duty is payable. 
These are the cases of a wine or spirit 
dealer on premises exclusively used 
for the sale of intoxicating liquor or 
mineral waters, the sale of liquor in 
licensed premises, passenger vessels, 
military canteens and railway restau¬ 
rant cars. 

Previous to the Licensing Act of 
1904, the licensing Justices had dis¬ 
cretion to grant or refuse any new 
license, renewal, transfer, or removal, 
subject to appeal in the case of renewals 
and transfers, and with certain excep¬ 
tions in the case of old beer and wine 
houses, licensed before May, 1869. 
Their powers, however, in regard to 
renewals and transfers of on-licenses 
have been considerably curtailed by 
the Act of 1904. They can only 
refuse renewals or transfers of such 
licenses on one of three grounds—- 

(1) Grounds connected with the 
character or fitness of the proposed 
holder of the license; 

(2) the ground that the licensed 
premises have been ill-conducted or 
are structurally inefficient or unsuit¬ 
able; 

(3) the ground that the renewal of 
the license would be void. 

It has been expressly provided that, 
if the licensing Justices refuse to renew 
an old on-license on the ground that 
the holder has persistently and un¬ 
reasonably refused to supply suitable 
refreshment (other than intoxicating 
liquor) at a reasonable price, or on 
the grounds that the holder of the 
license has failed to fulfil any reason¬ 
able undertaking given to the Justices 
on the grant or renewal of the license, 
the Justices shall be deemed to have 
refused the license on the ground 
that the premises have been ill-con- 
ducted. 


New licenses may be granted for 
any term not exceeding seven years 
instead of annually: In granting new 
licenses the Justices may attach various 
conditions to the license as to payment, 
tenure, etc., and they are required to 
secure to the public any “monopoly 
value” arising from the grant of the 
license. 

“Monopoly value, it may be ex¬ 
plained, means capital value—a defi¬ 
nite lump sum to be ascertained once 
for all. It will be the difference be¬ 
tween the value which the premises 
will bear when licensed, and the 
value of the same premises if they were 
not licensed, taking into account any 
expenditure there may be in respect of 
proper provision for suitable premises 
and good management. 

A register of all licenses issued by 
the Justices is required to be kept in 
every licensing district in a prescribed 
form. This must contain particulars 
of the licenses granted, the premises 
in respect of which they were granted, 
the names of the owners and the names 
of the holders of the licenses. The 
Clerk to the Justices must enter in the 
register notice of any conviction of 
the holder for any offence committed 
by him as such, including also any 
offence against the laws relating to 
the adulteration of drink. All for¬ 
feitures of Justices’ licenses, the dis¬ 
qualification of premises, and various 
other matters relating to the licenses 
must be entered on the register. Spe¬ 
cial provision is made under which 
ratepayers and others, including the 
police and officers of customs and 
excise, may inspect this register with¬ 
out payment. 

It may here be mentioned that police 
officers have wide powers of entering 
and inspecting licensed premises at 
practically any hour, for the purpose 
of ascertaining whether the law is 
being complied with in every respect. 



270 


The Annals of the American Academy 


The Country Inn 

One of the most picturesque features 
of England in olden days was the 
country inn. It was found in every 
village in the land. An inn has been 
variously described. Legally it is a 
place “instituted for passengers and 
wayfaring men. ” It is “ a house where 
a traveler is furnished with everything 
he has occasion for while on his way.” 
An inn is “a house the owner of which 
holds out that he will receive all 
travelers who are willing to pay a 
price adequate to the sort of accommo¬ 
dation required and who come in a 
situation in which they are fit to be 
received. ” 

An innkeeper may not select his 
guests. He cannot say to one, you 
may come into my inn, and to another 
you shall not. Innkeepers are a sort 
of public servant. In almost every 
case inns are fully licensed premises 
for the sale of all forms of spirits and 
beer. An innkeeper must supply his 
guests with food, but he is not obliged 
to provide them with intoxicating 
liquor. 

The Bona Fide Traveler 

Here one may refer to a very noted 
type of person in connection with the 
English law relating to intoxicating 
liquor—namely, the bona fide traveler. 
Special provision was formerly made 
by statute for the “needs” of such 
person from the point of view of drink 
and refreshments. A publican was 
allowed to supply a bona fide traveler 
with liquor, even in hours when his 
premises were closed under the license, 
provided that the traveler had lodged 
during the preceding night at some 
place at least three miles distant from 
the place where he required to be 
supplied with liquor, that distance to 
be calculated by the nearest public 
thoroughfare. This exemption from 


the ordinary licensing laws led to great 
and extensive abuse. It was not an 
uncommon sight to see whole armies 
of “thirsty souls” marching out on a 
Sunday morning when taverns were 
closed, so as to cover the necessary 
distance and entitle them to ask for the 
liquor they loved. This exemption 
has been swept away by a recent Act. 

A Famous Decision 

It may be of interest, as showing the 
difficulties under which the individual 
reformer works in England, to mention 
a somewhat famous legal decision of 
the Courts popularly known as the 
“one man one drink case.” A worthy 
citizen of London, having made his 
pile, decided to retire to his old 
country home and to do what he could 
for the furtherance of the interest 
and happiness of the good folk of 
the village. To this end, amongst 
other things, he purchased the lease of 
a public house in the locality which 
hitherto had been used solely for 
drinking purposes, and converted it 
into an inn with good accommodation 
for guests and visitors. The owners 
of the property, a firm of brewers, 
gave him a lease for 50 years, and he 
agreed not to use the premises other¬ 
wise than as an inn, tavern, or licensed 
house; that he would keep the house 
open in due and proper course of 
business during the greatest number 
of days and hours that should be 
allowed by law; and would conduct and 
manage the premises in a lawful and 
proper manner. He further agreed 
that he would do nothing whereby the 
trade or business or good will might 
be prejudicially affected. 

Having completed these prelimina¬ 
ries, the citizen in question, Mr. Till 
by name, had a notice put up on the 
inn to the effect that no one would be 
served with alcoholic drink more than 
once during any morning or afternoon 


English Law Relating to Sale of Intoxicating Liquors 


271 


or evening on any week day, and that 
on Sunday no one would be served 
with refreshment except visitors stay¬ 
ing in the hotel, their guests and 
travelers. The brewers did not like 
this. It contravened their agreement, 
they said, and they went to law with 
Mr. Till. The first Court to hear the 
case decided in his favor, but the Court 
of Appeal reversed their decision and 
held that the proposed mode of 
carrying on the business was a breach 
of the covenants of the lease. Mr. Till 
with sorrow had to yield. As he re¬ 
marked pathetically to a friend, in 
summing up the legal proceedings, 
“I obtained law, but not justice, in 
the Court of Appeal.” 

“Tied” vs. “Free” House 

The premises in the case above 
mentioned were what was termed a 
“tied” house. A “tied” house is a 
public house or saloon which is tied 
or bound by an agreement with a 
particular firm of brewers or distillers 
to take their liquor and their liquor 
only, and to conduct the business in 
accordance with conditions and re¬ 
strictions laid down and prescribed by 
the brewers. 

The alternative to the “tied” house 
is the “free” public house or saloon, 
the licensee of which is at liberty to 
buy his beer or other liquor from any 
brewery or distillery company or from 
different companies, if he so desires. 
A “tied” house belonging to a brewery 
company may be leased to a licensee on 
a yearly or other tenancy, subject 
usually to three months’ notice; or, in 
many cases, it may be placed under 
the charge of a manager who will then 
be merely a salaried servant of the 
company. The brewery company 
will thus have a large measure of 
control and a predominant influence 
over the lessee or manager of a “tied” 
house. 


The Brewer’s Gain 

It is only within the last twenty-five 
years or so that the “tied” house sys¬ 
tem has developed on a great scale. It 
is estimated that at the present time 94 
per cent of the public houses or saloons 
in England are “tied” houses. From 
one point of view this development 
may be said to represent the applica¬ 
tion of capital by the brewers towards 
the resuscitation of the publican’s or 
saloon keeper’s trade, threatened as 
it was both in Parliament and by a 
strong public temperance movement. 
Not infrequently a person who was 
without sufficient means to start a 
saloon, or even to carry on an existing 
one, has been able, with financial 
assistance from the brewers, to start 
a saloon or continue to carry one on, 
as a “tied” house, subject, of course, 
to a license being obtained from the 
Justices. A monopoly is thus estab¬ 
lished for the sale of a particular 
company’s beer, and at the same time 
the company are able to gather in the 
retailers as well as the wholesaler’s 
profit. 

There is no doubt that the organized 
combination of brewers and publicans, 
cemented as it is by their mutual 
interest in the “tied” houses, has been 
and is a powerful buttress of the liquor 
trade in Great Britain, and that it has 
been able to apply strong political 
pressure in Parliament when any 
measure has been introduced with a 
view to restricting the sale of intoxicat¬ 
ing drink, or otherwise controlling 
the liquor trade in the public interest. 

Compensation 

It is important to say a few words in 
reference to a matter which has already 
been touched on: namely, the subject 
of compensation to a publican whose 
license is withdrawn by the Justices. 
Mention has already been made of the 


272 


The Annals of the American Academy 


specific grounds on which it is open to 
the Justices to refuse to renew a license 
which had been in force before the 
year 1904. In such cases, if renewal is 
refused on any other ground, the 
publican is entitled to compensation 
provided by “the Trade” itself; that 
is to say, the “Trade” is obliged to 
come under the mutual insurance 
scheme first set up by the Licensing 
Act of 1904. 

Under that Act a compensation fund 
has been established for each county 
and for each borough with a population 
of over 50,000. Contributions to the 
fund are levied upon the licensed 
premises within this area. If a license 
is extinguished under circumstances 
which entitle the persons interested in 
the premises to compensation, this is 
provided for out of the compensation 
fund of the county or borough con¬ 
cerned. The amount of compensation 
is the difference between the value of 
the premises with the license, and their 
value without a license, including a 
sum for the depreciation of trade fix¬ 
tures arising by reason of the refusal to 
renew the license. 

The average figure payable in prac¬ 
tice in respect of compensation in 
England has worked out at about 
$8,000, or the equivalent of 35 years’ 
purchase—a very high figure. In Lon¬ 
don the amount at times has run up 
to $20,000 and even larger sums. 

Clubs 

Clubs in which intoxicating liquors 
are supplied to members first came 
under statutory control in 1902. The 
Licensing Act of that year made com¬ 
pulsory the registration of clubs sup¬ 
plying liquors. A license from the 
Justices for the sale of liquor in the 
premises of registered clubs was not 
and is not required. Provision was 
made in the Act by which a Court of 
Summary Jurisdiction, that is the 


Justices in Petty Sessions, might 
strike the club off the register on 
certain grounds such as these:—where 
the membership fell below 25; or the 
club was not conducted in good faith; 
where it was kept for an unlawful 
purpose or where frequent drunkenness 
occurred on the premises; where per¬ 
sons not being members were habit¬ 
ually admitted merely to get liquor. 
There are a number of cases in exist¬ 
ence where clubs have been formed and 
are used solely for drinking purposes 
and with a view to elude the ordinary 
licensing laws. Attempts are often 
made to use clubs of this kind to 
oppose temperance legislation. 

War-Time Measures 

Up to the eve of the war there was 
little ground for optimism on the 
drink question. In spite of minor 
improvements, in spite of increased 
taxation, notwithstanding great ad¬ 
vances in public education, the aggre¬ 
gate number of convictions for drunk¬ 
enness and the amount of alcohol 
consumed annually showed an upward 
tendency in the years prior to August, 
1914. 

But during and in consequence of 
the war, several emergency statutes 
were enacted dealing with the sale and 
consumption of liquor. By the In¬ 
toxicating Liquor Act of 1914, Li¬ 
censing Justices were empowered to 
make orders restricting the sale, supply 
or consumption of liquor upon licensed 
premises and in registered clubs. 

The Immature Spirits (Restriction) 
Act of 1915 was designed to reduce 
drunkenness by prohibiting the supply 
or sale of immature spirits. 

The Defence of the Realm Acts 
enabled the Naval and Military Au¬ 
thorities and the specially constituted 
“Central Liquor Control Board” to 
make drastic orders for regulating 
generally the trade in intoxicants. 


English Law Relating to Sale of Intoxicating Liquors 


273 


These, together with voluntary ar¬ 
rangements made by “the Trade” for 
early closing and the non-serving of 
women in the morning, brought about 
considerable improvement; but in the 
spring of 1915 the amount of excessive 
drinking and drunkenness were such as 
to necessitate further drastic action. 

Under these circumstances the Cen¬ 
tral Control Board was established. 
The general lines of their policy 
which were carried out throughout 
the war and afterwards may be 
classified under four heads: 

1. Curtailment of the hours of sale 
of alcohol, roughly by opening public 
houses at noon instead of 6 a.m. and 
closing them at 9 p.m. instead of at 11. 

2. Facilities for non-alcoholic re¬ 
freshment, notably by the establish¬ 
ment of canteens for food, for munition 
and transport workers. 

3. Facilities for reducing the alco¬ 
holic contents of spirituous liquors. 

4. Prohibition of incentives to ex¬ 
cessive consumption such as treating, 
credit and canvassing for liquor orders. 

The Case of Carlisle 

Further, the Board of Control, 
faced with special local circumstances 
in certain districts, bought out the 
whole drink trade in those areas, and 
managed the business themselves. The 
chief experiment was made in the 
Carlisle district, where were housed 
the majority of the men occupied in 
the large munitions area of Gretna. 
The adult male population of the city 
was doubled, and soon the records of 
convictions for drunkenness rose from 
an average of five per week in the 
autumn of 1915 to an average of 42 
per week in the month of June, 1916. 
Carlisle had then the highest propor¬ 
tion of convictions to population in 
England, and the list of total convic¬ 
tions exceeded those of towns seven 
times its size, such as Sheffield and Leeds. 

19 


Various restrictive orders were en¬ 
forced, but failed to check the in¬ 
creasing disorder, and therefore the 
Board of Control decided to acquire the 
licensed premises in Carlisle itself and 
in the two adjacent Petty Sessional 
Divisions, in order that they might 
obtain complete control without any 
delay. There was thus placed under 
direct control a district of some 500 
square miles with a war-time popula¬ 
tion of 140,000. By the end of 1916 
the Board were in actual possession of 
almost all the licensed premises in the 
area, and were able to introduce a new 
system of management. 

Success of Restrictive 
Regulations 

It should be noted that the Board 
had no immunity from general re¬ 
strictions and no unfair advantage as 
traders. They paid property tax and 
made a grant to the local authorities 
in lieu of rates, while the managers of 
the controlled houses were as liable 
to prosecution for offences as the 
ordinary publican. 

Never before had such an extensive 
scheme of management been tried on 
such a scale in the United Kingdom. 
All pecuniary inducements to encour¬ 
age the sale of alcoholic drinks was 
entirely eliminated, and the salaries 
paid to managers were not in any way 
dependent upon the sales of beer and 
spirits. Another change was brought 
about by the removal of all liquor ad¬ 
vertisements from the exterior of the 
Board’s houses. 

Under disinterested management 
the scheme of control had two forms: 
First, restrictive regulations, and sec¬ 
ondly, constructive arrangements. The 
restrictions were in addition to the 
general restrictions framed for war 
purposes enforced in all scheduled 
areas, and as they were designed to 
meet abnormal circumstances, are of 


274 


The Annals of the American Academy 


interest, for they show how easily 
under disinterested control regulations 
can be adjusted to suit emergency 
needs. There was a reduction in the 
number of licensed premises from 203 
to 69; by thus closing redundant and 
undesirable public houses temperance 
was directly promoted. Further, when 
the experiment was initiated, the 
number of premises with full licenses 
to supply spirit to be drunk off the 
premises was 101. These off-licenses 
were reduced to 15. 

The practice of selling a mixture of 
beer and spirits, a popular custom in 
the north of England, was altogether 
prohibited. There was also Sunday 
closing in order that the orders for 
sale and supply of alcoholic beverages, 
not only in licensed premises but in 
clubs, should be similar to those en¬ 
forced in adjacent areas of Scotland. 
Redundant breweries were closed down 
and the business of former wine and 
spirit merchants was concentrated at 
three central places. The sale of 
spirits to young persons under the age 
of 18 years, and the sale of beer to such 
persons, unless taken with a meal, was 
prohibited. 

These are the main directions of the 
restrictive regulations. On the con¬ 
structive side the Board tried to 
encourage the sale of food and non- 
intoxicants, and provided counter at¬ 
tractions to the drinking bars. There 
was a deliberate attempt to conduct a 
refreshment trade as opposed to a 
liquor trade, and food taverns were 
opened, where a properly cooked meal 
was offered to the public at a reason¬ 
able price. In addition to this, special 
arrangements were made for providing 
billiard rooms, reading rooms, bowling 
greens, and other attractions that 
might appeal to the social instincts of 
the people and thus challenge the 
appeal of the drink bar. 

The results of direct control are 


indisputable. The decline of drunk¬ 
enness is shown by the facts that, 
while the convictions in the first half 
of 1916 amounted to 564, during the 
first complete year of control they 
dropped to 320, and in 1918 to 80. 
This was the lowest on record in the 
history of the city. Even when al¬ 
lowance is made for the changes in the 
type of war workers and the shortage 
of beer and spirits, this decline in 
convictions is impressive. The ex¬ 
periment was profitable, for the re¬ 
turns have resulted in a considerable 
margin of profit to the state, although 
there was no exploitation of the 
consumer. 

The success of direct control at 
Carlisle is inextricably involved with 
the future of temperance reform in 
Great Britain, for the administration 
has transformed proposals into facts. 
Local residents, civil and police offi¬ 
cials, ministers of religion and trades 
union representatives have all paid 
their tribute to the manifest improve¬ 
ment in social order that has resulted. 
The beneficial effects of disinterested 
management at Carlisle have been so 
obvious and indisputable that it has 
directed temperance policy towards the 
principle that the community should 
have a freer voice in settling local 
licensing arrangements. 

Recent Legislation 

To return to recent laws affecting 
the sale of intoxicants, the Licensing 
Act of 1921 maintained the foundation 
of the scheme of restriction established 
by the Central Control Board during 
the war, by prohibiting the sale of 
liquor in the afternoon and curtailing 
the sale in the morning. Instead of 
“closing hours” for licensed premises, 
we have now under this Act “ permitted 
hours.” Thus, in effect, the hours 
during which intoxicating liquor may 
be sold have been reduced throughout 


English Law Relating to Sale of Intoxicating Liquors 


27 5 


the country from 16 or 17 out of the 
24 to 8 or 8| hours, with a small 
additional concession applicable only 
in the case of London. 

Continuing the principle adopted 
during the war, spirits and beer as 
supplied for sale are of considerably 
less strength than in pre-war days. 

Perhaps the most important recent 
Act of Parliament is the Temperance 
(Scotland) Act which, though passed 
in the year 1913, only came into 
operation in 1920. That Act gives 
to the people of Scotland the right of 
local veto. On the receipt of a requisi¬ 
tion, by not less than one tenth of the 
electors of a particular area as defined 
in the statute, the local authority is 
required to take a poll of the electors 
at which the following questions are to 
be submitted: 

(1) “No change” resolution; which 
means that the powers and discretion 
of the existing licensing Courts shall 
remain unchanged. 

(2) Limiting resolution; which means 
that the number of licenses for the sale 
of drink shall be reduced by at least 
one quarter. 

(3) “No license” resolution; which 
means that no license for the sale of 
drink shall be granted except for inns 
and hotels or restaurants in special 
cases. The Act goes on to provide 
what particular percentage of the 
voters is required to carry the specific 
resolution in each case. It is too early 
to form definite conclusions as to the 
effect of this important statute, but a 
weak point is that clubs are not 
prohibited selling intoxicants in areas 
which go dry. 

So far it has not led to any great 
change, but its provisions have been 
actually applied in a limited number 
of cases towards vetoing the issue of 
further licenses in certain areas. It 
should be added that a resolution 
under the Act, once carried, remains 


in force until it is superseded by a 
resolution carried at a further poll; 
and that no further poll may be taken 
for three years and then only on the 
requisition of 10 per cent of the electors 
who desire a change. Once a limiting 
resolution or a “no license” resolution 
has been carried, a bare majority of 
the votes recorded will prevent it 
from being repealed on any further 
poll. 

“Private Members’ Bills” 

Most of the proposals for control¬ 
ling, restricting, or otherwise dealing 
with the liquor trade, however, have 
taken the form of what is known as 
“Private Members’ Bills”; that is to 
say, the Government does not take any 
responsibility for them nor guarantee 
the necessary facilities for piloting the 
measures through Parliament. In 1922 
four temperance bills were introduced 
into the House of Commons. 

(1) The Liquor Traffic Local Veto 
(England & Wales) Bill proposed to 
empower one tenth of the electors in 
a parish, borough, or urban district, or 
any ward thereof, to demand a poll on 
the simple issue, “No License” or 
“License.” 

(2) The Temperance (Wales) Bill 
was also a local veto measure, but it 
proposed to allow three options—“No 
Change,” “Limitation” and “No Li¬ 
cense.” 

(3) The Temperance (England) Bill 
proposed to provide that a poll of 
electors in every county and large 
borough should be taken automatic¬ 
ally every three years on the three 
options—“No Change,” “A 50% Re¬ 
duction” and “No License”; also on 
the question whether the sale of in¬ 
toxicating liquors should be permitted 
on Sunday. 

(4) The Liquor (Popular Control) 
Bill was introduced by myself and 
other members belonging to different 


276 


The Annals of the American Academy 


political parties. It was designed to 
set up an entirely new system of deal¬ 
ing with the liquor traffic. Triennial 
polls of the electorate were to be taken, 
and voting was to decide by a simple 
majority whether there should be “No 
Change,” “Reorganization,” or “No 
License.” 

The Liquor (Popular Control) 
Bill 

The clauses of the Bill were neces¬ 
sarily many, but the main principles 
may be summarized thus: It recog¬ 
nized that no great change should be 
made in the social habits of the people 
without a clear indication of popular 
approval. There was no suggestion of 
national prohibition, but the Bill gave 
the inhabitants of boroughs and coun¬ 
ties the right of deciding whether they 
wished certain changes to take place in 
their localities. They could vote peri¬ 
odically for no change at all, or for the 
abolition of all licenses, or for the re¬ 
organization of the trade on the lines of 
disinterested management. 

If the decisive vote was for reorgan¬ 
ization, a central body, somewhat like 
the Port of London or Mersey Dock 
Board, would take over the liquor 
trade in the area concerned. This 
would not be a licensing authority or a 
Government department, nor would it 
possess the war-time powers of the 
Central Control Board. It would, 
however, have the power and duty to 
close all redundant public houses, to 
abolish grocers’ licenses, to raise the 
age at which spirits may be served to 
young persons from 16 to 18, and to 
make such structural alterations as 
would make it easier for food and non¬ 
intoxicants to be served in public 
houses. 

Many temperance schemes in the 
past have been wrecked on the rock of 
compensation. Under this Bill a Cen¬ 
tral Compensation Fund would have 


been created, into which all profits 
from the reorganized areas would be 
paid, as well as the trade levy estab¬ 
lished by the 1904 Licensing Act. 
None of the compensation money re¬ 
quired would come from the taxpayer, 
and there would be no actual or con¬ 
tingent liability on public funds. These 
proposals offered, in my opinion, a 
scheme which was fair to all interests 
in “the Trade,” whether brewer, pub¬ 
lican or shareholder, and contained a 
sound basis for legislation; and in 
particular was likely to win support 
for the principle of local option from 
that large section of the public who 
have yet to be converted to it and who 
have refused the older proposal on the 
lines of the Scottish Act. 

Licensing Bills 

Four licensing bills have been placed 
before the House of Commons during 
the current Parliamentary Session of 
1923. Two of these measures appear 
to represent a reaction in favor of 
the interests of “the Trade.” As to 
the other two, one was introduced by 
the Prohibitionist Member of Parlia¬ 
ment representing Dundee. It was en¬ 
titled “A Bill to prohibit the manufac¬ 
ture, importation and sale of alcoholic 
liquors for beverage purposes.” “The 
Trade” was forthwith to come to an end, 
all existing licenses were to be cancelled 
and no new licenses issued. Alcohol 
must in future be labelled “Poison,” 
and could only be supplied for medic¬ 
inal purposes on the certificate of qual¬ 
ified medical practitioners. This meas¬ 
ure has been rejected in Parliament by 
an overwhelming majority, indicating 
the present attitude of public opinion to 
prohibition by Act of Parliament. The 
last of the four bills referred to—the 
Intoxicating Liquor (Sale to Persons 
under Eighteen) Bill was introduced 
by myself. It proposes to prohibit the 
sale of intoxicating. liquor in bars to 


277 


English Law Relating to Sale of Intoxicating Liquors 


young persons under the age of 18 , and 
has had, on the whole, a friendly and 
encouraging reception. 

The Temperance Movement in 
Great Britain 

Great and persistent efforts have 
been made over a period of many years 
by numerous temperance organizations 
in this country towards a reduction in 
the national consumption of intoxicat¬ 
ing liquors and the democratic control 
of “the Trade.” One of the most 
influential of these organizations in the 
past has been The United Kingdom 
Alliance. The view of this society is 
that the liquor problem is insoluble and 
has always proved to be insoluble by 
regulation , and that the conclusion 
which the founders of the Alliance have 
laid down still holds good: namely, 
that 

The history and results of all past 
legislation in regard to the liquor traffic 
abundantly prove that it is. impossible 
satisfactorily to limit or regulate a system 
so essentially mischievous in its tendencies. 

The ultimate goal of the Alliance is 
prohibition, but this is recognized not 
to be within the domain of practical 
politics at the moment. Accordingly, 
the Society presses upon Parliament 
its demand for a Local Option Act for 
England and Wales as the only effec¬ 
tive method of dealing with the liquor 
traffic. 

There are various other temperance 
associations in Great Britain working 
steadily for greater control of the liq¬ 
uor traffic. The Temperance Legisla¬ 
tion League, for example, advocates 
state control and local option. Those 
who support these associations believe 
that it is reasonable to advocate such a 
control of the liquor traffic as will re¬ 
strict the inducement to over-indulge in 
alcohol, without unduly interfering 
with the liberty of the subject. 

During this year a campaign has 


been initiated by the Temperance 
Council of the Christian Churches 
which is supported by the heads of 
every Christian denomination. The 
programme of this Council consists of 
Sunday closing, the licensing of clubs, 
no sale of intoxicants to juveniles under 
18 , and local option. The support that 
is being given by the British public to 
this programme is widespread and en¬ 
couraging. Women’s organizations are 
beginning to favor the introduction of 
such equitable and progressive legisla¬ 
tion. The influence of women voters 
is definitely on the increase, and there 
are signs that they are likely to cast 
their votes on the side of drink reform, 
for they know more intimately than 
men how alcohol anaesthetizes the 
moral judgment and diminishes self- 
control. 

Obstacles in the Way 

The obstacles, however, to carrying 
out a temperance policy are manifold, 
as is well shown by the fact that, up to 
the present time, no political party in 
England has yet put forward a definite 
temperance programme. No British 
industry has such a powerful organiza¬ 
tion, or is so strongly or ably represented 
in Parliament and in municipal life as 
the liquor trade. In order to combat 
the increasing power of temperance 
advocates there have grown up during 
the past few years in England a number 
of societies with attractive titles such 
as “The True Temperance Associa¬ 
tion,” or the “Fellowship of Freedom 
and Reform.” These are really politi¬ 
cal allies of the trade, with an income 
so largely derived from profits on the 
sale of beer and spirits that it is diffi¬ 
cult to distinguish between their policy 
and that of the licensed trade. 

The largely increased activity re¬ 
cently of the liquor trade has been 
made possible by their huge profits, 
and by the simultaneous reduction in 


278 


The Annals of the American Academy 


the income of all voluntary philan¬ 
thropic bodies. War'poverty has lim¬ 
ited the activities of the temperance 
forces, whereas the profits of the brew¬ 
ers alone are nearly eight million ster¬ 
ling more than they were before the 
war. Whether the religious com¬ 
munity, the economic need for greater 


efficiency, increasing medical knowl¬ 
edge and a growing public conscience 
will be sufficiently strong to defeat the 
political intimidation practised by the 
liquor trade, time only can show. I 
believe they will, because of my abid¬ 
ing faith that ultimately right must 
always prevail. 


The Anti-Saloon League—Why and What? 

By Harry M. Chalfant 
Editor, American Issue, Pennsylvania Edition 


T HE Anti-Saloon League came into 
existence at Oberlin, Ohio, in the 
month of May, 1893. It was con¬ 
ceived in the brain of Rev. Howard H. 
Russell, a former student of Oberlin and, 
for some years prior to 1893, pastor 
of a Congregational church in Chicago. 

In the long struggle to suppress 
drunkenness, many organizations have 
•been conceived and born. Most of 
them have died a natural death within 
a brief period. After the Civil War 
drunkenness steadily increased. The 
liquor traffic grew and flourished 
until, as a commercial enterprise, it 
overshadowed most others of which 
the land could boast. Up to the close 
of the last century, the most efficient 
group in the movement to curb drunk¬ 
enness was the Women’s Christian 
Temperance Union. Through the in¬ 
fluence of the leaders of that organi¬ 
zation, every state in the Union adopt¬ 
ed laws requiring the teaching of 
scientific temperance in the public 
schools. But the women were denied 
the right of suffrage and hence their 
influence in politics was not an im¬ 
portant factor. 

On the other hand, the strongly 
financed liquor interests maintained 
powerful lobbies at Washington and in 
every state capital of the nation. Year 
after year witnessed the enactment 
of laws more favorable to the saloon 
and more detrimental to sobriety. 

Such were some of the existing 
conditions when this Chicago preacher 
dreamed of a federated church, organ¬ 
ized and marching as one army to the 
defense of the country against its most 
powerful internal foe. 


What? 

Ask the average man to define the 
Anti-Saloon League. He will tell you 
that it consists of a small group of 
individuals who go over the country 
lecturing, organizing and keeping up 
eternal turmoil and agitation. His 
idea of the movement may be the 
same whether he is a believer in it or 
is opposed to all it stands for. While 
this is the popular conception of the 
League, it contains in it only a faint 
shadow of the real thing. The Anti- 
Saloon League is as thoroughly organ¬ 
ized and as scientifically managed as 
any institution in America, whose pur¬ 
pose it is to influence public sentiment 
and establish the principles for which 
it stands. 

The unit through which the League 
works is the individual congregation. 
It touches this congregation in two 
ways. As a rule, one of its speakers 
annually appears in the pulpit and 
delivers an address on some phase of 
prohibition work. At the close of his 
address he appeals for financial sup¬ 
port, not from the congregation as a 
whole, but from such individuals as are 
in sympathy with the work which is 
being done. From time to time these 
friends pay their money into its treas¬ 
ury and the League in turn regularly 
puts its literature in their hands, thus 
keeping in touch with them throughout 
the year. If an election is pending in 
which liquor is involved, they are 
furnished information as to candidates. 
If there is anything they want done in 
the way of law enforcement, they in¬ 
form the League and the League 


280 


The Annals of the American Academy 


deals with the proper government 
officials. 

The pastor of the church and pos¬ 
sibly a lay delegate meet with other 
pastors and other delegates and con¬ 
stitute what is variously called a con¬ 
ference, a synod, an association, a 
yearly meeting, etc. These meetings 
are held annually and represent a 
definite group of churches. The dele¬ 
gates of these groups consider the 
many phases of work committed to 
their care. Among other things there 
is generally more or less interest in 
temperance and prohibition. Each 
group which decides to use the Anti- 
Saloon League as its agency elects two 
trustees. In Pennsylvania, for in¬ 
stance, there are no less than thirty- 
five different religious bodies officially 
represented on the Board. 

These are the men who determine 
the policy of the organization. They 
select an Executive Committee. This 
Executive Committee in turn selects 
workers, fixes their salaries and, in 
general, supervises the finances and 
the policies of the movement in the 
interim of the meeting of the Board. 
These trustees elect representatives 
who constitute a National Board and 
that National Board controls the 
Anti-Saloon League of America. 

An Agent 

Thus it will be seen that the Anti- 
Saloon League is merely an agent of 
the churches. It is the agent which 
they have jointly chosen in order that 
they may act as one body on the ques¬ 
tion of prohibition. In Pennsylvania 
alone there are more than five thou¬ 
sand churches affiliated with the 
League. 

The relation between the national 
and state organizations resembles close¬ 
ly the relation between the federal 
and state governments. The League 
has its national superintendent and 


its head of legislative work at Wash¬ 
ington. Each state has a superin¬ 
tendent who works under the direction 
of, and in harmony with, this national 
officer. The state superintendent has 
under him a corps of men to carry on 
the work of his particular state. He 
has district superintendents who are 
assigned a group of counties for wdiich 
they are made responsible. They 
make all arrangements with pastors 
for meetings in the churches. They 
address all kinds of meetings. They 
keep tab on political conditions. Each 
state has its editor who specifically 
looks after its literature. The workers 
of each state keep watch on the con¬ 
duct of its legislature and of its chief 
executive officers. Through its plat¬ 
form work as well as its literature the 
organization is able to keep its friends 
informed as to the conduct of their 
lawmakers. 

The support of the Anti-Saloon 
League comes almost entirely in small 
contributions, averaging perhaps not 
over $4 per person annually. It works 
on the theory that where a man’s 
money is, there will his heart be. Its 
ultimate goal is the building of a public 
sentiment that will forever wipe out of 
existence the traffic in intoxicating 
liquor. In order to do this, it must 
enlist and maintain a veritable army 
of supporters. 

Its leaders never expected to attain 
their goal by moral suasion alone, nor 
by law alone. They believe that the 
enforcement of law and the education 
of the people in scientific temperance 
must go hand in hand. Such being the 
case, few, if any, of its men believed 
for a moment that his work was done 
when the Eighteenth Amendment was 
adopted. On the other hand, they 
recognized the necessity of a new 
enlistment for life, in order that the 
work which had been begun might be 
brought to a successful conclusion. 


The Anti-Saloon League 


281 


Personnel 

Just as in any great movement which 
has changed the tides of human con¬ 
duct, no explanation of the influence of 
the Anti-Saloon League is complete 
without some consideration of the 
personnel of its workers. A majority 
of its leaders are men who were trained 
for the ministry and had more or less 
experience as pastors. Another large 
block of them has been drawn from the 
ranks of the legal profession. Regard¬ 
less of whence they came, there are 
some things that these men have in 
common. The League pays each of 
them a living salary. Without ques¬ 
tion, many of them could go into other 
lines of endeavor with vastly better 
financial prospect, but their profound 
conviction of the call of duty holds 
them to this difficult task. 

The variety of talent embraced in the 
leadership of the Anti-Saloon League 
constitutes an interesting study. Does 
the League need dreamers, men who 
can peer into the far future, men 
of broad vision? It has its founder, 
Howard H. Russell, and its business 
manager, Ernest H. Cherrington. Does 
it need generalship? It has its Baker 
and its Wheeler. If it needs diplomacy 
it has its McBride and its Tope. 
There are times when nothing wins 
short of a genuine stand-up and knock¬ 
down process, and in that hour the 
League has its Shields, its White and 
its Anderson. 

These are types of the men who 
stand on the firing line. Back of 
them we find a group of counselors who 
give much of their time and all of 
their wisdom to the executive manage¬ 
ment of the League. Naturally, it 
needs the advice of men who have been 
eminently successful in business, and 
in this line it has in its service such 
men as S. S. Kresge, Frederick Fosdick 
and C. W. Masland. In ecclesiastical 


leadership it has in its service the help 
of such men as Bishop Nicholson of the 
Methodist church; Father J. J. Curran 
of the Catholic church and Dr. C. C. 
Hays, Moderator of the Presbyterian 
General Assembly. Among its chief 
counselors in political affairs it num¬ 
bers among its most active friends 
such men as Senators Capper, Shep¬ 
pard, Willis and Congressman Barkley 
and Kelly. 

Workers’ Conference 

Among the outstanding factors in 
the success of the League is the annual 
meeting of its workers. Here the 
state superintendents, together with 
their staffs, meet in conference with 
the workers of the national organi¬ 
zation. Prominent business men, as 
well as churchmen from the various 
state and national executive commit¬ 
tees, meet with the workers. While 
there is intelligent direction in these 
meetings, they are not, by any means, 
cut and dried affairs. In part, they 
partake of the experience meeting, in 
which men from different states set 
forth plans they have used in various 
phases of their work and tell of results. 
It is expected that these workers shall 
be just as frank in setting forth their 
failures as they have their successes. 

Nor do these meetings consist en¬ 
tirely of a recital of past experiences. 
There is always a forward look. Much 
time is devoted to the future program. 
In this group there are men who dream 
dreams and see visions of conditions 
that will confront the organization and 
the country a decade and a generation 
hence. 

Ten years ago the workers of the 
Anti-Saloon League in their annual 
conference were discussing conditions 
which are in existence today. It w r as 
their faith that constitutional pro¬ 
hibition would ultimately be adopted 
by the nation. Growing out of their 


282 


The Annals of the American Academy 


experience in states like Maine and 
Kansas, they anticipated in large 
measure the problem which the nation 
must meet today. 

Before a constitutional prohibition 
amendment was adopted, the leaders 
of this organization were pointing out 
the necessity of recruiting young men 
from colleges and universities for the 
new and difficult work which would 
confront the organization between the 
time when prohibition should be 
adopted, and that other date, some¬ 
where down the coming years, when it 
would be recognized as a permanent 
policy of the Republic. 

Non-Partisan 

The League has steadfastly refused 
to allow itself to be drawn into any 
political or religious controversy which 
did not have direct bearing on the liq¬ 
uor question. It has persistently re¬ 
fused the use of its machinery for other 
causes, be they ever so praiseworthy. 
It has raised one big question mark 
before the name of every candidate for 
public office. Is he right on this ques¬ 
tion? It has flatly refused to raise 
any question as to his political affili¬ 
ations or his convictions on other ques¬ 
tions of public concern. It has re¬ 
fused to inquire into his religious 
scruples. 

The writer once attended a confer¬ 
ence of the Anti-Saloon League work¬ 
ers and counselors in which the presid¬ 
ing officer was a well-known Roman 
Catholic priest, the Reverend J. J. 
Curran of Wilkes-Barre, Pa. He oc¬ 
cupied the pulpit of a Methodist church 
and introduced the various speakers. 
We do not recall the identity of all of 
them, but do remember that among 
those whom the priest introduced were 
a Methodist Bishop and a United 
Presbyterian missionary. This little 
incident shows the broad spirit of the 
organization. Another incident along 


the same line is the fact that one of the 
organization’s most popular and most 
successful platform lecturers is a lay 
member of the Catholic church, who 
has been freely admitted and welcomed 
to the pulpits of thousands of Protes¬ 
tant churches. 

A Machine 

By its enemies the accusation is 
lodged against the Anti-Saloon League 
that it is a machine—an intolerant 
political machine. Verily, the accusa¬ 
tion is true. The church is a machine 
and the League is a machine within a 
machine. Having acknowledged this 
fact, it is only fair to add that the ma¬ 
chine has been built and is used ex¬ 
clusively for one purpose—to run over, 
demolish and forever wipe out of exist¬ 
ence, the beverage liquor traffic whether 
legal or illegal. Of course it is intol¬ 
erant of any candidate who is lined up 
as a defender of the traffic. Assuredly 
it is in politics to stay until its work is 
done. How could it hope to destroy its 
enemy were it to stand aloof from its 
enemy’s most fruitful field of opera¬ 
tions? 

The ordinary political machine is 
built and maintained for the personal 
advantage of the biggest cogs in that 
machine. The Anti-Saloon League is 
so constructed that all personal ad¬ 
vantage of its workers is submerged to 
the one task of establishing sobriety 
in the nation. That is why no salaried 
worker of the Anti-Saloon League can 
become a candidate for public office 
without becoming an outlaw in the 
eyes of his organization. 

In pressing toward its ultimate goal, 
here in brief are some of the things the 
Anti-Saloon League has been doing. 

1. At Washington, as well as in 
every state capital, the League has for 
years maintained a corps of thoroughly 
trained men, whose business it has 
been to represent its constituency in 


The Anti-Saloon League 


283 


combating the work of the liquor 
lobbies. 

2. Lawmakers have learned to know 
that through the agency of the Anti- 
Saloon League their conduct in all 
matters pertaining to liquor legislation 
will be promptly reported to their 
constituents. 

3. In season and out of season the 
League workers have fought in defense 
of worthy public officials and have 
persistently demanded the political 
scalps of those who have not been in 
sympathy with its aims. 

4. The League has established a 
printing plant from which it turns out 
tons of literature every day in a never- 
ending stream, printed in more than a 
dozen languages, and used for the edu¬ 
cation of the public on the advantages 
of total abstinence and the dangers of 
alcohol. 


5. It has maintained not only a force 
of highly trained organizers and super¬ 
intendents covering every section of 
the country on week days, but has used 
these men on Sundays to carry the 
Gospel of prohibition annually to many 
millions of people. 

6. It has compelled the church to get 
on the fighting line. It has awakened 
her to her sense of power and privilege 
and has caused her cohorts to go forth 
triumphantly unhorsing the most cruel 
tyrant of the ages, King Alcohol. 

The bitterness with which the Anti- 
Saloon League has been assailed by the 
organized foes of prohibition, is eloquent 
testimony to its influence and its value 
to society. To the masses of the peo¬ 
ple it is either unknown or much mis¬ 
understood, but there are few com¬ 
munities where the fruit of its labors 
do not appear in some form or other. 


Why I Believe in Enforcing the Prohibition Laws 

By Gifford Pinchot 

Governor of Pennsylvania 


Y OU ask me why I am attempting 
to enforce the Eighteenth 
Amendment and the Volstead Law in 
the state of Pennsylvania. In the 
first place I recognize no distinction 
between the different articles of the 
Constitution of the United States. 
Washington warned us that future 
amendments would be as sacred as the 
original document. He was right be¬ 
yond all question. The Eighteenth 
Amendment is a part of our fundamen¬ 
tal law and anyone who breaks it 
breaks the fundamental law, is a law¬ 
breaker, and should be treated as such. 

Power and responsibility for enforc¬ 
ing the Volstead Law rest in the Na¬ 
tion and also in the State. Under the 
Eighteenth Amendment the two have 
concurrent jurisdiction. Both are re¬ 
sponsible for the enforcement of prohi¬ 
bition laws. 

A general conviction had existed 
throughout Pennsylvania previous to 
my administration, not only that the 
Volstead Act had not been enforced, 
but that no vigorous effort had ever 
been made to enforce it. Our people 
had seen men known to be opposed to 
the enforcement of the law selected to 
compel obedience to it on the part of 
others. They were told that appoint¬ 
ments to the position of enforcement 
agent had been treated as political 
spoils, and that politicians opposed to 
all that the law stands for had been 
permitted to name such agents. They 
believed that persons high in official 
places were constantly and openly vi¬ 
olating the spirit if not the letter of the 
law, and winking at its violation by 
others. They understood that liquor 


was sold almost as freely and openly as 
it was before the passage of the Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment. 

I regard any failure to enforce the 
Volstead Law as a blot on the good 
name of Pennsylvania and the United 
States. If allowed to continue it will 
amount to a serious charge against the 
fitness of our people for genuine self- 
government. 

We must either control the criminals 
who are openly breaking the law or be 
controlled by them. With all good 
citizens I believe that this Common¬ 
wealth is greater and more powerful 
than any band of lawbreakers whatso¬ 
ever and I am acting on that belief. 
And we are getting results. 

Certain self-styled leaders of public 
opinion like President Nicholas Murray 
Butler have taken it upon themselves 
to declare that the people of the United 
States are opposed to an amendment 
to the Constitution which has been 
adopted by an overwhelming majority 
of the states, although they do not 
tell us what special source of informa¬ 
tion led them so to believe. They 
also tell us that the fundamental law 
of the land so adopted cannot be en¬ 
forced. These two statements taken 
together mean, if they mean anything, 
that the people of the United States do 
not believe in the laws which they < 
themselves pass, and that they will not 
obey them. 

This talk is nothing more than perni¬ 
cious nonsense and worthy of attention 
only as it demonstrates the utter inca¬ 
pacity of the men who make it either to 
realize and live up to the clear duty of 
an American citizen, or to understand 


Why I Believe in Enforcing the Prohibition Laws 


285 


what has been going on in the minds of 
the plain people of this country for the 
last three or four generations. As a 
matter of fact not even slavery itself 
was more thoroughly discussed in ad¬ 
vance of a decision than this very mat¬ 
ter of prohibition, and no decision ever 
taken by our people was ever more 
deliberately registered or more clearly 
in accordance with the popular will. 

There are two ways to enforce the 
Eighteenth Amendment, both of them 
necessary. One is to arrest and pun¬ 
ish lawbreakers and thereby make the 
risk of lawbreaking so great as to reduce 
its attractiveness to the criminal. The 
other is to bring the forces of decency 
and good citizenship to bear and so 
create a public sentiment which will 
not stand for lawbreaking for the sake 
of any drink more than it will stand for 
lawbreaking for the sake of plunder. 
The moral sense of the American 
people—the backbone of this Common¬ 
wealth—is overwhelmingly behind law 
enforcement. The actively bad, the 
morally lax, the self-indulgent, and the 
thoughtless are arrayed on the other 
side. What chance have they in the 
long run against the people who do the 
thinking and the voting and the produc¬ 
ing in this country of ours? Precisely 
the same chance as a snowball in the 
bottomless pit and no more. 

It is perfectly true that the forces of 
lawlessness are in some respects well 
organized—well organized both politi¬ 
cally and commercially. They are, 
however, in the hopeless minority and 


it is only necessary for the forces of de¬ 
cency to show that they are really in 
earnest to have the opposition melt 
away. I have confidence enough in 
the American people to believe—and 
no one can shake my conviction—that 
when a moral issue is put squarely be¬ 
fore them they always decide right. 
This is a moral issue. It is being 
put squarely before them, at least in 
the state of Pennsylvania, and I have 
not the slightest question about the 
ultimate result. 

I believe that the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment will add uncountable millions to 
the wealth of the United States; will 
enormously increase the prosperity of 
our people and will raise happiness and 
welfare, especially of our women and 
children, to a new and higher plane. 
I believe, as every man does who knows 
the facts, that a very formidable per¬ 
centage of crime, misery and misfor¬ 
tune flows straight out of the liquor 
traffic; that the moral condition of the 
whole community has already been 
enormously benefited by the Eight¬ 
eenth Amendment and that it will be 
benefited still more when the law comes 
to be better enforced. As a matter of 
fact crime and disease have been nota¬ 
bly reduced already by its action and 
that action, of course, has only begun 
to be felt. 

I am for prohibition. I am for the 
enforcement of the liquor laws. I 
am for both because I believe that in 
this way lies the well-being and the 
prosperity of this great people. 












THE BUSINESS CYCLE 


Being the supplement to the 

September, 1923, number of The Annals, No 198 
on Prohibition and Its Enforcement 


Editor-in-Charge 
CLYDE L. KING 









American Expansion and Industrial Stability 

By Henry S. Dennison 

President Dennison Manufacturing Company 


O F all industrialized countries, the 
United States is most subject to 
the extremes of prosperity and de¬ 
pression which arise from the cyclical 
movement of general business. This 
is perhaps to be expected in a country 
where the natural resources are not as 
yet fully developed, where the labor 
market, compared with the possibilities 
of production, is relatively limited, 
where individualism inspires intense 
and scattered energies, and where the 
banking system is not highly central¬ 
ized. Most of the elements, however, 
which cause American business to run 
to extremes are traceable to the fact 
that the majority of business managers 
have no definite plan for normal 
growth and are heedless of funda¬ 
mental economic conditions. The re¬ 
sult of this lack of a defined policy 
has been that American business, 
instead of progressing on a relatively 
stable course, has been subject to a 
succession of violent checks. 

Value of Careful Planning 

That business can expand steadily 
and at the same time adjust itself to 
the rise and fall of the tide has been 
illustrated by the experience of many 
concerns. Though no firm can hope 
to "escape entirely the ill effects of a 
general depression, careful planning 
and definite policies will minimize 
them. First, means can be devised 
for overcoming seasonal fluctuations; 
and second, plans looking far beyond 
the immediate present and based on 
the underlying trend can be formed to 
limit expansion in boom times and 
to take up the slack in depression. 
Though the means of solution of the 


first problem are different from those of 
the second, they are nevertheless an aid. 

The fluctuations of production aris¬ 
ing from the irregularities of seasonal 
demand can be diminished by planning 
merchandise ahead, by getting cus¬ 
tomers to order early, by developing 
a proper proportion of staples, by 
training operators for more than one 
job, and by manufacturing in dull 
times stock merchandise and merchan¬ 
dise of high-labor and low-material 
content. Again, in industries like 
transportation and building, work can 
be planned so as to avoid idleness 
incident to inclement weather. The 
result of this elimination of seasonal 
fluctuation is a reduction of those 
losses which are due to high labor 
turnover, to overtime production, 
costly in dollars and in decreased 
efficiency, and to the profitless over¬ 
head of dull times. 

Theory of Relativity Applied 

But expansion, which is the normal 
tendency of all industry in a growing 
country, is not concerned primarily 
with seasonal fluctuations, but with 
the waves of the cyclical movement. 
That business activity can be flattened 
out to the straight line of growth is 
improbable. If, however, the extreme 
height of the wave can be decreased, 
with it will come a corresponding 
decrease in the trough. In other 
words, enterprises which have suc¬ 
ceeded in attaining relatively stable 
expansion have come to realize that, 
while there are practically no limits to 
the ultimate expansion of American 
industry, there is a rate of expansion too 
great to be maintained and assimilated. 


20 


289 


&£)0 The Annals of the 

If expansion is to be normal, the 
manufacturer must always bear in 
mind the relation of the normal growth 
of his enterprise to the growth of 
general business. If he is guided by 
this relation, he will not be led in times 
of riotous prosperity to overestimate 
future requirements and prices. For 
these overestimates lead to overex¬ 
tension of plant, to overpurchase of 
materials and merchandise, to de¬ 
creased efficiency in labor and in man¬ 
agement and to an overstraining of 
credit. Moreover, all these mistakes 
are committed when the prices of 
commodities and labor are at the peak. 

Also the manager who has taken 
warning will not be caught off balance 
at the turn of the tide and will be in a 
position to take advantage of general 
dullness and low prices to build his 
plant to take care of normal growth. 
Plans for this construction, moreover, 
will be made in prosperous times. 
Further, by having curtailed purchases, 
he is free from a high cost inventory, 
actual or impending, and can go out to 
do business at some profit. Again, 
byrestraining advertising, by curtailing 
sales effort and by withholding new 


American Academy 

merchandise in prosperous times, he is 
now able to stimulate buying by apply¬ 
ing added pressure through each of 
these agencies. 

Restraint 

Now is the time for American busi¬ 
ness men to exercise restraint. They 
should recognize that present pros¬ 
perity is primarily dependent upon a 
domestic market which has a very real 
limit to its rate of growth. Particu¬ 
larly is this true of the agricultural 
community which, in normal times, 
relies on Europe for profits. On the 
other hand, the American market is so 
great in possibilities that, if business 
men could seek only a normal expan¬ 
sion of their enterprises, moderate 
prosperity might be prolonged—per¬ 
haps indefinitely. And no group has 
greater opportunity for real service 
than the bankers. For they can curb 
credit to those managers who, com¬ 
pletely losing their sense of proportion, 
would, by riotous competition for 
goods and services, disturb the orderly 
growth of the whole, and again subject 
the nation to a prolonged period of 
depression. 


Business Men and the Business Cycle 

By C. H. Crennan 

Continental and Commercial National Bank, Chicago, Ill. 


B USINESS men are chiefly respon¬ 
sible for the peaks and valleys in 
business. This statement may be 
something of a shock to politicians, 
who are sure to claim credit for good 
business and “pass the buck” to world 
conditions or the war or something of 
the sort when business gets bad. 

Politics is the natural enemy of 
business. Business men know this, but 
try to preserve an armed neutrality. 
Politicians also know it, but they are 
more interested in political capital than 
business capital. It is an open secret 
that political pressure on the Federal 
Reserve Board delayed the raising of 
rediscount rates in 1919, with unfortu¬ 
nate results the next year. Political 
pressure on the railroads has not always 
improved their position. But it is 
scarcely necessary to pile up evidence! 
Business men know the situation. They 
just haven’t talked about it. However, 
since the conduct of business is their 
responsibility, they have been put on 
the defensive and are becoming aggres¬ 
sive. Moreover, it must not be forgot¬ 
ten that political fortunes will be affected 
by the condition of business in 1924. 

The proposition that business men 
are really answerable for business may 
be too flat-footed a generalization to 
rest well with economists. It contains 
none of the pet hedges of the craft, such 
as “in the long run” and “other things 
being equal.” However, the monu¬ 
mental work on the business cycle by an 
economist, Wesley C. Mitchell, gives 
support to the proposition as it em¬ 
phasizes the structure of our economic 
life in accounting for the periodic ebb 
and flow of business. 


Business Men Responsible 
for Business 

Business generates its own stresses, 
like rising costs and tension in the 
money markets, that turn the rising 
curve of business expansion into a 
falling curve of business contraction. 
Business also develops its own correc¬ 
tives, not always so soon as some people 
desire, but more economically than 
under most of the plans offered by 
politicians. 

Business men place the orders that 
start the wheels of industry, give em¬ 
ployment to labor and put funds to 
work. The studies of the Harvard Uni¬ 
versity Committee on Economic Re¬ 
search confirm the responsibility of busi¬ 
ness men for the condition of business. 
Personal proof can be secured without 
much difficulty by any trained observer, 
strategically located to see the wheels 
go round. Also, most business men 
realize and accept their responsibility 
as part of the day’s work. They may 
be looking at business narrowly, only 
as the profits or losses of their own 
concerns are involved. They may 
be watching changes in their own lines 
of business. But an increasing num¬ 
ber of business men know that they 
must watch the broader changes of 
business that make up a business 
cycle. As they see and foresee these 
changes correctly they are likely 
to make profits. If they misjudge the 
state of trade they incur extra risks, if 
not losses. This can be given statis¬ 
tical demonstration, if necessary. The 
conduct of business is the business 
man’s job. 


291 


292 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Labor and Agriculture 
Only Incidental 

Business men are likely to look at 
labor’s relation to the business cycle as 
a matter of labor costs, or even wage 
scales. When prices rise, after a time, 
costs ordinarily rise and labor is not 
always the least of those costs. The 
so-called “vicious circle” of prices and 
wages begins. Finally, increased costs 
cut the margin of profit so thin that 
business men stop expanding their 
business or shrink commitments. The 
stress of increased costs is one of the 
influences that turns business expansion 
into contraction. 

Labor has a stake in the business 
cycle in the way of employment and 
wages that business men realize, but 
as “entrepreneurs,” or whatever the 
economists call them, business men 
must look at labor from a cost and 
efficiency angle. And except for some 
near-leaders, who would undermine or 
overthrow the institution of private 
property, the heads of organized labor 
seem to be willing to let business men 
have the responsibility for the condition 
of business. 

There are farmers who are business 
men. Others raise crops and do it 
well, but know little about marketing 
and business. There are some who 
are merely “hands” on their own 
farms. But the farmer’s relation to 
the business cycle is different from that 
of other producing agents. 

The influence of the business cycle 
on the farmer’s operations seems to be 
slight. Indeed, the influence of the 
farmer’s operations on the cycle is not 
so pronounced as many would have us 
believe. The farmer did not cause the 
expansion stage of the present business 
cycle or contribute to it, except in an 
incidental way. It is unfortunate that 
he has not participated as fully as 
others, but he has participated. The 


farmer’s position is not so bad as 
it has been pictured, but, whatever it 
may be, it is not going to put an end 
to a business movement which it did 
not create. 

Fears versus Facts 

How business men feel about the 
business situation helps to make it good 
or bad. They base their decisions in 
part on the statistical trend of business, 
but what they decide is also reflected in 
those statistics. If at any time, then, 
enough business men become alarmed 
about their prospects, even though the 
statistical position of business is sound, 
they can curtail their commitments 
and activity to such degree as to change 
statistics for the worse. It is true that 
we must not disregard unfavorable 
news, but neither should we get dis¬ 
couraged without a perspective of the 
business situation as a whole. More¬ 
over, unfounded fears or hopes are just 
as contagious as if they were well 
founded. 

Business sentiment changes almost 
overnight. During the months of 
February and March of this year there 
was much loose talk about inflation. 
Inflation is now a “dead dog.” 
However, many business men were 
frightened because business was ex¬ 
panding. They were afraid that 
business would run away with itself. 
They were made more fearful by a few 
self-appointed guardians of the Reserve 
System who bombarded the country 
with anti-inflation propaganda when 
there was no inflation. This fear of 
inflation persisted until the price of 
stocks declined in April and broke 
sharply, early in May. Even though 
there were conditions within the 
market itself that partly accounted 
for this decline, those who place 
their faith in the market as the 
barometer of business feared that the 
end of business expansion had come, or 


Business Men and the Business Cycde 


293 


would very soon be here. Speculators 
and even business men shifted from the 
fear of overdoing expansion to the fear 
that the expansion stage of the busi¬ 
ness cycle would not continue. 

The erratic behavior of the stock 
market in June caused further con¬ 
fusion about fundamental business 
conditions. A clearer perspective of 
the business situation is needed. It 
will probably be needed in the early fall. 
Also, everyone should remind himself 
occasionally that things are never quite 
so bad or so good as they seem. 

Although the way people feel about 
business is a shifting sort of thing, with 
minor ups and downs, it is also true that 
over a period of three to four years 
business sentiment usually runs a 
definite course. This course is partly 
caused by the business cycle and partly 
affects the cycle. When business be¬ 
gins to recover from depression, people 
become hopeful. After the expansion 
stage of a business cycle is well under 
way, they become confident that busi¬ 
ness will always be good. But doubts 
arise as signs of business contraction 
appear, and when depression comes, 
people literally give themselves over to 
the fear that business will never be 
good again. They let their feelings 
run without the checkrein of reason, 
just as the “bulls” and “bears” reg¬ 
ularly overrun their charted course in 
the stock market. 

Business sentiment will probably 
run the usual course of hope, confidence, 
doubt and fear in the present cycle. 
However, the memory of our recent 
grief is still so fresh that business 
men seem to be unusually nervous and 
fearful. While caution is desirable in 
the management of business affairs, it 
is possible to become needlessly fearful. 

No Business Depression in 1923 

The weight of well-grounded opinion 
at the time of writing this story is to the 


effect that business is still on a firm 
basis. Production has been against 
actual orders. In certain lines of busi¬ 
ness a delayed seasonal movement of 
goods resulted in some accumulation. 
However, the important point is that 
there is a far closer adjustment of 
production and consumption than was 
found at the peak of business in 1920. 
Profits, though somewhat spotty, have 
actually been made and dividends are 
being paid. In few instances have 
costs risen to the danger point. Com¬ 
modity prices are not running wild, for 
the simple but important reason that 
sellers are keeping their eyes fixed on 
what buyers will and will not pay. 
There is no tension in the money 
markets and business men are still 
cautious in making commitments. 

Though business sentiment has its 
day-to-day effect on the trend of busi¬ 
ness, the cyclical movements of senti¬ 
ment and business are of first impor¬ 
tance. To gauge these major move¬ 
ments precedent is often sought. If 
precedent is in point, the contraction 
stage of a business cycle does not begin 
with conditions as they have been this 
summer. A major downswing of busi¬ 
ness has regularly been accompanied by 
large inventory accumulations and the 
stress of increased costs and tension in 
the money markets. Money, that most 
sensitive of barometers, does not 
indicate business depression in 1923. 

If business men are to keep their 
feelings on straight, the point cannot 
be overemphasized that conservative 
policies in business at the present stage 
of the cycle are one thing; irrational 
fears are another. 

Business Changes Can Be 
Measured 

The first proposition in this paper is 
that business men are the keepers of 
business. The other generalization 
is that this business cycle is being 


294 


The Annals of the American Academy 


watched more closely than cycles in 
the past. Guess is giving way to 
measurement. 

Incidentally, it has been the expe¬ 
rience of those trying to measure the 
cyclical movement of business that 
opinion is less trustworthy than 
statistics. If the opinions of business 
men are just “hunches” or the patter 
of the street, shun them. If those 
opinions are judgments based on a 
well-rounded analysis of the statistical 
position of business, cleave to them. 
An actual case may illustrate the point. 
In July, 1920, a questionnaire on busi¬ 
ness conditions was sent to business 
men all over the country. All ques¬ 
tionnaires are a nuisance, but this 
particular questionnaire was more 
poorly drafted than most. However, 
the returns came in and the answers to 
some of the questions were tabulated. 
All of the returns contained the state¬ 
ment that inventories were not abnor¬ 
mally heavy. These business men 
were not liars. They were simply 
“kidding themselves.” They hadn’t 
defined the term “abnormally heavy.” 
It was a bad term. But the break in 
business was on them and they didn’t 
know it. Terrible inventory losses 
became the order of the day. Opinion 
went wrong. Certain statisticians 
were right. 

The present cycle of business—it 
began about the last quarter of 1921— 
is being measured as none before, for 
two simple reasons: First, we have 
more and better statistics to use; 
second, more work is being done in 
determining what has happened in the 
past, in checking present changes 
against experience and thereby getting 
more accurate measurements of what is 
happening now. 

Not only is the present cycle being 
measured more closely than previous 
ones, but the information is being 
brought to the attention of business 


men as never before. Newspapers are 
discovering that business news is real 
news. Banks are putting out bulle¬ 
tins—some good and some not so 
good—for the guidance of correspond¬ 
ents and customers. A few economists 
in and out of business are getting a 
foothold with business men and once in 
a while, at least, are influencing business 
policies. Business men are fairly deluged 
with circulars about “business serv¬ 
ices.” The problem is not how to get 
such a commercial or business service, 
but what one or ones to select. And 
judging by the recent performance of 
one much advertised soothsayer, this 
problem of choice is a real one. 

No Ready-Made Formulas 

Of late years statistical information 
has become so abundant that business 
men have little excuse for not keeping 
posted on the trend of events. When 
business is in the valley, they are likely 
to give close consideration to general 
business news. They have time to 
reflect on and talk over the causes of 
business contraction. The real dif¬ 
ficulty in the past has been that busi¬ 
ness men have not watched the statis¬ 
tics of business closely enough during 
periods of prosperity. WTien business 
is expanding, the pressure of daily 
duties tends to crowd economic reflec¬ 
tion to the outer edge of their fields of 
consciousness. And yet it is during a 
period of business expansion that wise 
executives will set aside some of their 
time to keep advised of the actual 
trend of business. 

There should be no mistake about 
one point raised by the assertion that 
business men should study the statis¬ 
tics of business—no ready-made an¬ 
swers exist to fit the situation of each 
business man. He must apply the 
general news of business for himself to 
his own case. He should know more 
about his business than anyone else. 



Business Men and 

However, analyses of the business 
eycle should be helpful in bringing to 
the notice of business men conditions 
and changes that lie somewhat outside 
their specialized fields of activity, but 
may vitally affect profits. 

A Challenge to Economists 

Business men have to see and fore¬ 
see and forecast future conditions in 
making commitments. Economists 
have too often been reluctant to take 
similar risks. Perhaps they have been 
too much engrossed in the futile search 
for the cause of value. But those 
economists who wish to be of real 
service to business men must take a 
chance, go wrong and then try to 
narrow the margin of probable error. 
In the writer’s opinion, one of the 
most practical developments in eco¬ 
nomics lies in the measurement of the 
business cycle. 

Business men are eager for the 
economist’s findings on the trend of 
business. They are really dependent 
on economists and statisticians. But 
economists must talk the language of 
business men if they are to “get their 
stuff across.” They must cut down 


the Business Cycle 295 

their wordage. But most important, 
they must get rid of a lot of their 
erudition. Too many economists 
write and talk for the benefit of fellow 
economists. The fear of not being 
erudite clutters up what would other¬ 
wise be perfectly intelligible stories. 
Of course this is heterodoxy, but a 
roll call of the few economists who 
really count with business men would 
startle the craft. These few do not 
need interpreters. 

Thread of the Argument 

The thread of this argument is that 
business men have the responsibility 
for business conditions. They are 
getting more and better information 
about this business cycle than ever 
before. The memory of their recent 
grief is so vivid that they are unusually 
timid. They are also eager for 
information. They want sound inter¬ 
pretation of the business cycle. This 
interpretation is largely the job of 
economists. But economists must 
“condescend” to write for business 
men. They must meet the business 
man half way. He must try harder to 
understand them. Fifty-fifty. 


/ 

Br 


Germany’s New Labor Legislation 

By Emil Frankel 


T HE collapse of the mighty German 
war machine in November, 1918, 
forced the reactionary authorities to 
relinquish the governmental powers to 
the great mass of the workers. The 
socialist leaders, who were quick to 
assume the reigns of government, now 
had a chance to transform into reality 
ideas which had long been incorporated 
in their party program, and for which 
they had led an intrepid struggle for 
decades. They were also quick to see, 
however, that the Germany they had 
inherited—with its industrial life com¬ 
pletely disorganized and its people 
utterly impoverished and demoralized 
—was no fit object for extreme social¬ 
istic experiments, and they resisted 
strenuously all efforts of the radicals, 
especially those who wanted to “drive 
forward the revolution” after the 
Russian example. 

Out of the struggles of the revolu¬ 
tionary period there emerged in Ger¬ 
many a democratic-parliamentary sys¬ 
tem. The attempts of the workers 
to obtain industrial democracy at the 
same time were not to be successful. 
Nor were the workers able to effect 
fundamental changes in the traditional 
relations between capital and labor. 
Nevertheless, they were able to make 
an impression upon the labor laws 
enacted during and after the revolution, 
which reflects the great change that has 
taken place in the workers’ position in 
the new Germany. 

The labor legislation before the war, 
although it no doubt conferred consider¬ 
able social benefits, bore the stamp of 


the absolutistic character of the State. 
It reflects the attitude of deep distrust 
and suspicion of the governing classes 
toward the workers and toward their 
organizations. The enforcement of 
the labor laws was completely in the 
hands of the reactionary authorities 
who wielded their enormous powers 
entirely in an arbitrary and one-sided 
fashion, and were particularly active 
where it meant curtailment of the 
workers’ right of association and meet¬ 
ing. In vain did the workers attempt 
to secure legal instruments which 
would give them a voice in determin¬ 
ing the conditions under which they 
were to work. Only after overcoming 
enormous opposition were they able to 
introduce voluntary collective bar¬ 
gaining, and then only in a limited 
number of small scale industries. The 
State took no cognizance whatsoever 
of this form of self-administration in 
industry, which it regarded as an 
“encroachment upon the freedom of 
the individual labor contract.” The 
workers’ efforts to secure a more direct 
participation in the larger industrial 
process and in economic life, naturally 
were foredoomed to failure. 

The new labor legislation, in con¬ 
trast, recognizes the importance of 
labor as a factor in economic life, 
removes many of the traditional em¬ 
ployer’s rights inherent in the individ¬ 
ualistic conception of the labor con¬ 
tract, and shows a distinct tendency 
towards recognition of the social 
principle in labor relations. The 
workers’ concrete achievements in the 
new German labor legislation may be 
summarized somewhat as follows: 


296 






Germany’s New Labor Legislation 


297 


(1) The introduction of the univer¬ 
sal eight-hour day. 

(2) Government protection against 
the vicissitudes of sickness, total dis¬ 
ability, invalidity, old age, etc. 

(3) Constitutional recognition of the 
workers’ fundamental right to combine 
for the purpose of defending and 
promoting labor and living conditions. 

(4) Legal recognition of the trade 
unions as the competent representa¬ 
tives of the workers, and as such, social 
bodies which are to participate on a 
basis of equality with the employer in 
all phases of labor administration 
(employment service, conciliation 
boards, labor courts, etc.), and in the 
general industrial development (Na¬ 
tional Economic Council, representa¬ 
tion on board of directors in industrial 
establishments, representation on man¬ 
aging bodies of the “socialized” in¬ 
dustries). 

(5) As a corollary to the recognition 
of the trade unions, disappearance of 
individual labor bargaining and the 
substitution for it of the collective 
determination of the labor contract, 
and the introduction of the principle of 
self-government in industry. 

(6) The legal recognition of collec¬ 
tive agreements voluntarily entered 
into between employers and employees, 
the stipulations of which can be made 
legally binding. The regulation of 
working conditions proceeds from the 
organized industrial groups directly 
concerned, and the intention of the law 
is to intercede only when self-govern¬ 
ment fails. 

(7) The establishment of the con¬ 
stitutional principle in industry 
through legal workers’ representatives 
in the establishment which gives them 
the right to participate in the regula¬ 
tion of wages and working conditions 
and to gain an insight into industrial 
management. 

(8) Constitutional recognition of the 


socialization principle in the manage¬ 
ment of industry, which so far has 
found its realization in the workers’ 
participation in the management of 
the coal and potash industry. 

II 

Before discussing the details of the 
new labor laws and the problems of 
future labor legislation in Germany, it 
may not be amiss to give in broad out¬ 
lines the development of labor legis¬ 
lation before the overturn of the 
Imperial regime. This development 
is similar to that of other modern in¬ 
dustrial states and proceeds out of 
Germany’s change from an agricultural 
to an industrial country. How¬ 
ever, it takes on a peculiar aspect due 
to the absolutistic character of the 
State and to the preponderance of 
military interests. The sacro-sanct 
principle of the ‘freedom of contract’ 
in labor relations was free to express 
itself in inhumanly long working hours, 
unchecked night and Sunday labor and 
unrestrained woman and child labor. 
The deleterious effects of this unbridled 
exploitation of the labor power soon 
became apparent in the conditions of 
health of the workers. The State, 
especially the Prussian military author¬ 
ities, became thoroughly alarmed be¬ 
cause of the second-rate recruits com¬ 
ing from the populous industrial 
districts, and the result was the enact¬ 
ment in 1839 of a law for the protection 
of working youths. This was soon 
followed by a number of protective 
measures for other classes of workers. 
Due to the agitation of bourgeois social 
reformers and the trade unions which 
appeared on the scene in the mean¬ 
time, existing protective labor measures 
were considerably extended in 1878, 
and a system of factory inspection was 
created. 

From 1878 to 1890 there was a lull 
in the enactment of measures for the 


298 


The Annals of the American Academy 


protection of labor. Bismarck fought 
his battle against the constantly grow¬ 
ing socialist movement, whose demands 
for thoroughgoing social reforms he 
sharply opposed. By initiating a 
comprehensive social insurance system 
(1883-1889) he thought to win the 
workers over to his side and keep them 
away from the “dangerous” socialists. 
This was, however, without success. 
Insurrectionary uprisings of the miners 
in 1889 caused the young Emperor 
William II, then in his social reform 
period, to create the workers’protective 
laws of 1891. It was his hope also that 
this would halt the continually growing 
socialist movement. The new laws 
went a step further than previous 
enactments and contained provisions 
for Sunday rest, a maximum work-day 
in health injurious occupations, pro¬ 
tection of woman and child labor, 
voluntary shop committees, obligatory 
issuance of shop-regulations, etc. The 
new law also created industrial courts 
composed of an equal number of em¬ 
ployers and workers’ representatives 
presided over by an impartial chairman, 
for the adjudication of disputes arising 
out of the individual labor contract. 

Wilhelm’s success in extirpating the 
socialist trade unions was no greater 
than Bismarck’s, and in the next 
decades the constantly growing trade 
union movement was able to secure the 
enactment of a number of important 
workers’ protective measures such as 
child labor laws, the introduction of the 
general ten-hour work-day and night 
rest for women, the law regulating 
domestic work, etc. 

In spite of constant attacks upon 
the right of association and chicanery 
on the part of the authorities, which 
sometimes developed into severe co¬ 
ercive measures, prosecution and 
outlawry, the trade union movement 
began to grow. In a continued fight 
with the State authorities, who were 


backed by the powerful industrial 
interests, the workers were neverthe¬ 
less able to influence the course of 
workers’ protective legislation, as we 
have seen, and even break into the 
autocratic administration of the social 
insurance system. In all the years of 
their existence the trade unions’ efforts 
were directed chiefly, however, to 
break through the fetters restricting 
the rights of combination but which the 
State authorities very gradually lifted, 
then only under the severest pressure. 
Under what difficulties the workers 
labored may be seen from the fact that 
as late as 1914, at the outbreak of the 
World War, the trade unions were 
considering ways and means to ward 
off an attack planned by the Imperial 
Government upon the workers’ right 
to associate and upon trade unionism 
in general. Despite the many ob¬ 
stacles placed in the workers’ way of 
legal recognition of their organizations, 
they were able to extend voluntary 
collective bargaining with employers, 
and by that means they succeeded to a 
considerable extent to advance their 
position. 

However, a few years before the 
outbreak of the World War a very 
strong reaction against labors' demands 
set in. German employers were tired 
of social reforms which entailed enor¬ 
mous expenditures on the part of the 
State and meant heavy taxation bur¬ 
dens for themselves. They saw, too, 
that social reforms did not hinder 
the growth of the trade unions which 
seemed to them to be assuming more 
and more a predatory attitude. The 
employers w^ere very determined to 
resist the trade unions’ efforts toward 
radical social reforms, and to counter¬ 
act their influence the employers also 
began to form powerful associations. 
Aided by the State authorities they 
took up the cudgels against the trade 
unions in earnest and, from about 1912 


Germany’s New Labor Legislation 


299 


until the beginning of the war, labor 
legislation could make very little 
progress in Germany. 

The World War, however, soon was 
to give labor a new status and labor 
legislation a new course. Under the 
pressure of the titanic struggle the 
military government grudgingly began 
to recognize the value of the trade 
unions as mass organizations and 
curried their favor. The trade unions 
were acknowledged more and more as 
the competent representatives of the 
interests of the workers. This found 
its legal recognition in the creation 
of workers’ and salaried employees’ 
committees, and the establishment of 
joint committees of employees and 
employers for the settlement of labor 
disputes. Many of the restrictions on 
the rights of association were removed, 
and the State authorities even urged 
upon reluctant employers the making 
of collective agreements to prevent 
industrial controversies. In the sum¬ 
mer of 1918 the trade unions, en¬ 
couraged by the treatment accorded 
them during the war, began to work 
out a comprehensive program of so¬ 
cial reforms which they intended to put 
through at the conclusion of the war. 

Ill 

The work of the trade unions and 
socialists to secure social reforms with¬ 
in the frame of the absolutistic-mon- 
archistic State was unexpectedly in¬ 
terrupted through the collapse of the 
German military machine in Novem¬ 
ber, 1918. The workers suddenly 
found themselves in complete posses¬ 
sion of the powers of State, an event to 
which they had been looking forward 
with longing for decades. It is not 
surprising, therefore, that the social¬ 
ists who had assumed the reigns of 
government made it known that they 
felt it to be their duty to “realize the 
socialist program.” Among their 


first deeds (announcement of No¬ 
vember 12, 1918) was the introduction 
of the eight-hour day and their efforts 
to sweep away the most offensive in¬ 
equalities of the workers: viz., aboli¬ 
tion of all restrictions of rights of com¬ 
bination and meeting, abrogation of 
special legislation against agricultural 
workers and domestic servants, in¬ 
troduction of universal suffrage, etc. 

An event, however, which proved to 
be of the utmost importance to the 
after-revolutionary development of 
labor legislation in Germany, was the 
consummation of a pact between all 
the important employers’ and workers’ 
organizations, negotiations for which 
had already been begun in October, 
1918, when the industrial leaders on 
both sides realized that the avalanche 
was upon them. In this agreement, 
signed November 15, 1918, the German 
employers for the first time recognized 
the trade unions as the competent rep¬ 
resentatives of the workers, and es¬ 
tablished the following basic principles 
for the regulation of labor relations: 

(1) There were to be no limits placed 
upon the rights of coalition. 

(2) The company unions, the so- 
called “yellow” unions, were to be 
left to themselves and in future to be 
neither directly nor indirectly sup¬ 
ported by the employer. 

(3) The conditions of labor for all 
workers were to be regulated through 
collective agreements. 

(4) All establishments with more 
than fifty employees were to elect 
workers’ committees to represent their 
interests and to act as organs of control 
for the collective agreements. 

(5) The maximum work-day was 
fixed at eight hours. 

(6) The public employment service 
was to be regulated jointly by the 
employers and employees. 

In the wake of the revolution, the 
socialist government in its desire to 




300 


The Annals of the American Academy 


revise and extend labor legislation, 
issued in rapid succession a large num¬ 
ber of labor decrees which sprang 
chiefly from three sources: (1) The 
necessities incident to industrial de¬ 
mobilization; (2) the joint agreement 
of the employers’ and workers’ organ¬ 
izations to which the government gave 
official recognition; and (3) the de¬ 
mands of the radical workers for greatly 
enlarged labor rights, for the Council 
System patterned after the Russian 
Soviet model and for industrial social¬ 
ization. 1 

In further explanation of these 
labor decrees: 

(1) The demobilization measures 
which were issued in large numbers had 
to do mainly with the transfer of war¬ 
time industries into peace-time indus¬ 
tries, the reemployment of discharged 
soldiers and sailors, and care of the 
unemployed. Few of these measures 
are in force in their original form now, 
and need not be discussed here in de¬ 
tail. 

(2) In carrying out the stipulations 
of the joint agreement there were 
created quite a number of legal 
measures of which the following are the 
most important: A law regulating the 
general legal position of collective 
agreements under which two important 
basic principles were established: First, 
the so-called UnabdingbarJceit , that 
forbids deviations from the norm 
in collective agreements, which means 
that the agreement entered into be¬ 
tween the contracting parties cannot 
be altered through separate agreements 
stipulating conditions less favorable 
than those agreed upon; and second, 
the legal extension of collective agree¬ 
ments voluntarily entered into by non¬ 
contractual parties, if in the opinion of 
the authorities such agreements have 

A comprehensive exposition of the new labor 


come to have preponderating impor¬ 
tance in regulating the working condi¬ 
tions in an industry within the territory 
covered by the agreement. 

Employees’ representation through 
creation of workers’ and salaried 
employees’ committees in all estab¬ 
lishments having twenty or more em¬ 
ployees, the committees to be entrusted 
with the task of guarding the workers’ 
interests in the establishment to see 
that collective agreements are ob¬ 
served, and if there is no collective 
agreement to regulate with the trade 
unions the wages and working condi¬ 
tions. 

Extension of the industrial concilia¬ 
tion system through the creation of 
conciliation boards, composed of an 
equal number of employers’ and em¬ 
ployees’ representatives, presided over 
by an impartial chairman selected by 
the board itself, or one appointed by 
the Ministry of Labor. 2 

Besides these a number of govern¬ 
mental orders issued in 1918 and 1919 
regulated the eight-hour day for 
workers and salaried employees, estab¬ 
lished protection against unjustifiable 
discharge, extended the public employ¬ 
ment service and created a system of 
unemployment relief. The govern¬ 
ment also promulgated an order regu¬ 
lating the conditions of work for agri¬ 
cultural laborers, which is regarded as 
the initial step towards real protection 
for this hitherto neglected class of 
workers. 

(3) The movement of the radicals 
which aimed at the immediate realiza¬ 
tion of industrial democracy took on 
two forms: First, the demand for the 
“proletarian dictatorship” after the 


2 Legal regulation of collective agreements, 
workers’ and salaried employees’ committees and 
conciliation boards was effected through the 
^ Verordnung fiber Traifvertrage, Arbeiter & 
legislation in Germany will be found in WalterAngestellten Ausschiisse & Schlichtung von 
Kaskel’s Das Neue Arbeitsrecht. " Arbeitsstreitigkeiten of December 23, 1918. 


i 


Germany’s New Labor Legislation 


301 


Russian Soviet model through workers’ 
and soldiers’ councils which would take 
over the individual establishments as 
well as Germany’s entire industrial 
apparatus and which would also estab¬ 
lish their political supremacy by ex¬ 
ercising full legislative, administrative 
and judicial functions. The govern¬ 
ment which definitely opposed the 
council system secured the establish¬ 
ment of a democratic-parliamentary 
system in Germany. In response to 
the demands of the great mass of the 
workers which declined the “proleta¬ 
rian dictatorship,” but nevertheless 
wanted some kind of a council system 
which would strengthen their position 
within the establishment and give them 
a determining voice in the production 
process, the government secured the 
enactment of the Works Council Law 
of January 18, 1920, which made it 
obligatory upon all establishments 
employing twenty or more persons to 
institute works Councils. The func¬ 
tions of the councils are (1) partici¬ 
pation in the regulation of wages and 
working conditions within the estab¬ 
lishment, (2) exercise of a certain 
control over the engagement and 
dismissal of workers, and (3) a limited 
participation in industrial management 
through the right to inspect books, etc., 
and to be represented on the board of 
directors—all functions which did not 
give the workers exactly a determining 
voice equal to that of the employer, 
but which were considerably in advance 
over those the workers and salaried 
committees enjoyed heretofore. 

The second form the fight of the 
revolutionary workers took on was the 
demand for immediate industrial so¬ 
cialization, that is the abolition of 
private ownership and the substitution 
of collective ownership of the means of 
production. Here likewise the govern¬ 
ment’s opposition, which could see in 
socialization only a very gradual and 


slow process and one possible of 
application only upon highly monopo¬ 
lized industries. The result of the 
socialization movement, which at one 
time had assumed threatening pro¬ 
portions, especially among the miners, 
was the creation of the so-called 
Gemeinwirt-schaftliche, a community 
organization of the coal and potash 
industries which left the basis of own¬ 
ership untouched and provided for a 
series of joint (employers’ and em¬ 
ployees’) administration boards for the 
regulation of these two industries, and 
which gave the workers representation 
on the boards of directors and managing 
committees of the syndicates, organ¬ 
izations of the individual concerns of 
the industry . 3 

IV 

The changed status of the worker in 
the new Germany and the tremendous 
importance attached to economics in 
the modern state found a significant 
expression in the incorporation in the 
new German constitution, a whole 
chapter of which deals with “economic 
life.” Due to the composition of the 
constituent National Assembly in 
which the socialists were not able to 
gain the majority and had to enter 
into a coalition with the forward-look¬ 
ing bourgeois groups, the new consti¬ 
tution was given a decided liberal and 
democratic tinge. The individualistic 
conception of the economic structure 
was very evident, and private property 
rights were left untouched. The so¬ 
cialists, nevertheless, were able to 
make some inroads upon the individual¬ 
istic conception of the “freedom of the 
labor contract” by incorporating in the 
economic section of the new constitu¬ 
tion provisions stipulating definite 

3 Gesetz betreffend Regelung der Kohlemoirt- 
schaft of March 23, 1919, and Gesetz betreffend die 
Regelung der Kaliwirtschaft of April 24, 1919. 


302 


The Annals of the American Academy 


social bindings in place of the individ¬ 
ualistic contract. 

The workers’ general position in the 
new Germany is fixed in article 157 of 
the Republican constitution, which 
declared human labor to be under the 
special protection of the national gov¬ 
ernment, and in article 163, which 
recognizes the workers’ rights to gainful 
employment and to a livelihood. 

The workers’ long fight for freedom 
of coalition finds its fruition in article 
159, which guarantees to everybody 
the right of combination to defend and 
promote labor and living conditions; 
and wdiich also declares as illegal any 
agreements and measures which are 
likely to limit or impede the freedom 
of combination. 

The workers’ demand for protection 
against the vicissitudes of life finds its 
expression in article 161, which makes 
it incumbent upon the national govern¬ 
ment to create a comprehensive system 
of insurance for the purpose of preserv¬ 
ing health, protecting maternity, pro¬ 
viding against the economic effects of 
old age, etc. 

The workers’ right to a voice in the 
production process is definitely fixed 
in article 165 of the constitution, which 
provides “that the workers jointly 
with the employers, and having equal 
rights, are called upon to participate in 
the regulation of wages and working 
conditions, and to take part in the 
general economic development of the 
nation’s productive forces.” To en¬ 
able the workers to exercise these 
functions this article provides for 
Establishment Works Councils, for 
District Works Councils (a grouping 
of the Establishment Works Councils 
according to economic districts) and 
for a National Works Council. These 
councils, representing primarily the 
workers’ interests, are to be supple¬ 
mented through a system of economic 
councils, to give the workers opportu¬ 


nity to participate in larger economic 
functions, viz., district economic coun¬ 
cils formed by the District Works 
Councils jointly with the employers, 
and in a National Economic Council. 
The National Economic Council has 
the right to express its opinion on 
economic, social and political bills of 
fundamental importance which the 
government must submit before pre¬ 
senting them to the Reichstag. The 
Council itself can initiate such bills. 
The various workers’ and economic 
councils enumerated here may have 
conferred upon them powers of control 
and administration in the fields of 
activity assigned to them. 

The efforts of the workers to enlarge 
the basis of ownership of industries, 
land, etc., finds its expression in 
article 156 of the constitution, which 
authorizes the government by means 
of legislation and on payment of just 
compensation (1) to transfer to public 
ownership all industries suitable for 
socialization, (2) to combine, if neces¬ 
sary, industrial enterprises and place 
them under socialized management, 
and (3) to regulate the production and 
distribution of the necessities of life 
according to socialistic principles. 
Article 155 puts all natural resources 
under the control of the State, as well 
as the distribution and use of land, to 
encourage settling, to promote agri¬ 
culture, etc. This article also gives 
the government the 'right to appro¬ 
priate the “unearned increment” in 
land values for the benefit of the com¬ 
munity. 

V 

The new German constitution de¬ 
clares itself in principle for an inter¬ 
national regulation of labor affairs. 
As a signatory of the Treaty of Ver¬ 
sailles, which contains in its labor part 
provisions for the international regula¬ 
tions of labor conditions, Germany also 


303 


Germany’s New Labor Legislation 


pledged itself to enact the labor laws 
agreed upon at the Washington Con¬ 
ference of the International Labor 
Organization of the League of Nations 
(October 2'9-November 29, 1919). 

These laws deal chiefly with the estab¬ 
lishment of the eight-hour day, exten¬ 
sion of free employment service and 
combatting of unemployment, inter¬ 
national reciprocity in conferring 
benefits of labor protective laws, 
protection of women (prohibition of 
employment after confinement, night 
work, health injurious occupations), 
regulation of child labor, and extension 
and application of the international 
convention adopted in Berne (1906) on 
the prohibition of the use of white 
phosphorus in the manufacture of 
matches. As we have seen, many of 
the provisions contained in the draft 
conventions of the Washington con¬ 
ference have already been put on the 
statute books in Germany without 
reference to the international labor 
code. The German Government has 
not yet ratified the Washington agree¬ 
ment, however, but declared its read¬ 
iness to do so when other countries 
such as England, France or Belgium 
ratify it. 

The early promise of the socialist 
government to create uniform labor 
laws is repeated in article 157 of the 
constitution. In accordance with its 
promise the government appointed a 
commission in May, 1919, whose task 
it was not merely to codify existing 
labor laws, but to draft a labor code 
more in accordance with the principles 
enunciated in the new constitution. 
So far not much has been accomplished 
toward the drafting of such a labor 
code, largely because the task in itself 
proved to be a tremendous one and 
also because of the widely different 
conceptions of such a labor code 
among the many interests represented 
on the commission. 


VI 

The creation of new laws in execution 
of the extensive program of labor legis¬ 
lation contained in the constitution has 
not progressed very far in Germany. 
Until now the only definite enactment 
is the Employment Service Act of 1922. 
There are a large number of labor leg¬ 
islative measures in preparation, how¬ 
ever, some of which are likely to be 
enacted in the not too distant future. 
The most important of these are: (1) 
A Work Time Law, aiming at a 
uniform regulation of the hours of 
work in industry and agriculture, (2) 
Unemployment Insurance as a sub¬ 
stitute for the present method of money 
grants to the unemployed, (3) Com¬ 
prehensive Conciliation Law to regu¬ 
late uniformly the various methods in 
vogue in settling industrial disputes, 
and (4) a Domestic Employees Law 
to regulate the general legal position of 
domestic employees. 

However, with the enactment of the 
labor laws at present proposed by the 
government, the trade union and 
socialist efforts to extent the sphere of 
labor legislation will not cease. The 
German workers seem to be resolved 
to extend the political equality they 
have gained into economic life as 
well. Frequent expressions to that 
effect in their press, and at their party 
and trade union congresses, give 
evidence that they are determined to 
get rid of the remaining vestiges of the 
absolutistic principle in industry, and 
achieve for themselves in labor admin¬ 
istration a position of equality with 
the employer. They seem to be 
aware, however, that the process of 
labor interpenetration cannot be the 
work of a day and moreover must 
proceed within the frame of existing 
institutions, 

The workers’ efforts at present seem 
to be focused upon securing the follow- 


304 


The Annals of the American Academy 


ing measures: 4 Concentration of all 
labor affairs upon labor boards, demo¬ 
cratically organized, which would take 
over all the functions of labor admin¬ 
istration (employment service, in¬ 
dustrial conciliation, supervision of 
collective agreements, social insurance, 
etc.) now exercised by a large number 
of separate bodies without having any 
organic relations to one another. A 
part of the labor boards would be 
specially created, known as Workers’ 
Courts, completely independent of the 
judicial system to insure the worker 
full equality in labor adjudication. 
These Workers’ Courts, composed of 
an equal number of workers’ and em¬ 
ployers’ representatives and presided 

4 See especially the Protokoll der Verhand- 
lungen des eJften Kongresses der Gewerkschaften 
Deutschlands, Leipzig, June 19-24, 1922. 


over by a judge thoroughly imbued 
with the social point of view, would 
serve all gainfully employed and 
intervene in all individual labor 
disputes. Finally the workers want 
in all future labor laws a more extensive 
application of the principle of self- 
government in industry through repre¬ 
sentative organized industrial forces. 
The instrument through which this can 
be achieved best is considered to be 
the collective agreement, which cuts 
bureaucratic administration down 
to a minimum, and allows industry 
to establish its own principles, 
which are given the force of an 
industrial law. When the State’s aid is 
sought it would be primarily as a 
mediator—as a dictator only as a 
last resort when self-government has 
failed. 


Canons of Journalism 


In May of 1922 The Annals pub¬ 
lished a special volume dealing with 
the “Ethics of the Professions and of 
Business.” This volume included a 
discussion of the Canons of Ethics 
adopted by the editors of Oregon, 
Missouri and Kansas. On April 28 
of this year the American Association 
of Newspaper Editors, composed of 
the men who direct the editorial and 
news policies of nearly one hundred of 
the great American dailies, adopted 
the following Canons of Journalism, 
thus putting the newspaper profession 
among the other professions that are 
declaring high standards of conduct 
in their public relationships. 

Canons of Journalism 

The primary function of newspapers 
is to communicate to the human 
race what its members do, feel, and 
think. Journalism, therefore, de¬ 
mands of its practitioners the widest 
range of intelligence, of knowledge, 
and of experience, as well as natural 
and trained powers of observation and 
reasoning. To its opportunities as a 
chronicle are indissolubly linked its 
obligations as teacher and interpreter. 

To the end of finding some means of 
codifying sound practice and just 
aspirations of American journalism 
these canons are set forth: 

I. Responsibility 

The right of a newspaper to attract 
and hold readers is restricted by 
nothing but considerations of public 
welfare. The use a newspaper makes 
of the share of public attention it 
gains serves to determine its sense of 
responsibility, which it shares with 
every member of its staff. A journal¬ 
ist who uses his power for any selfish 
or otherwise unworthy purpose is 
faithless to a high trust. 


II. Freedom of the Press 

Freedom of the press is to be 
guarded as a vital right of mankind. 
It is the unquestionable right to dis¬ 
cuss whatever is not explicitly for¬ 
bidden by law, including the wisdom 
of any restrictive statute. 

III. Independence 

Freedom from all obligations except 
that of fidelity to the public interest is 
vital. 

(1) Promotion of any private 
interest contrary to the general wel¬ 
fare, for whatever reason, is not com¬ 
patible with honest journalism. So- 
called news communications from 
private sources should not be pub¬ 
lished without public notice of their 
source or else substantiation of their 
claims to value as news, both in form 
and substance. 

(2) Partisanship in editorial com¬ 
ment, which knowingly departs from 
the truth, does violence to the best 
spirit of American journalism; in the 
news columns it is subversive of a 
fundamental principle of the pro¬ 
fession. 

IV. Sincerity, Truthfulness, 
Accuracy 

Good faith with the reader is the 
foundation of all journalism worthy 
of the name. 

(1) By every consideration of 
good faith a newspaper is constrained 
to be truthful. It is not to be 
excused for lack of thoroughness or 
accuracy within its control or failure 
to obtain command of these essential 
qualities. 

(2) Headlines should be fully 
warranted by the contents of the 
articles which they surmount. 


21 


305 


306 


The Annals of the American Academy 


V. Impartiality 

Sound practice makes clear dis¬ 
tinction between news reports and 
expressions of opinion. News reports 
should be free from opinion or bias of 
any kind. 

(1) This rule does not apply to so- 
called special articles unmistakably 
devoted to advocacy or characterized 
by a signature authorizing the writer’s 
own conclusions and interpretations. 

VI. Fair Play 

A newspaper should not publish 
unofficial charges affecting reputation 
or moral character without opportunity 
given to the accused to be heard; 
right practice demands the giving of 
such opportunity in all cases of serious 
accusation outside judicial proceed¬ 
ings. 

(1) A newspaper should not invade 
private rights or feelings without sure 


warrant of public right as distin¬ 
guished from public curiosity. 

(2) It is the privilege, as it is the 
duty, of a newspaper to make prompt 
and complete correction of its own 
serious mistakes of fact or opinion, 
whatever their origin. 

VII. Decency 

A newspaper cannot escape con¬ 
viction of insincerity if, while profess¬ 
ing high moral purpose, it supplies 
incentives to base conduct, such as are 
to be found in details of crime and 
vice, publication of which is not 
demonstrably for the general good. 
Lacking authority to enforce its 
canons, the journalism here repre¬ 
sented can but express the hope that 
deliberate pandering to vicious in¬ 
stincts will encounter effective public 
disapproval or yield to the influence 
of a preponderant professional con¬ 
demnation. 


The American Peace Award 

Created by Edward W. Bok 

FOREWORD 

By the President of the Academy, Dr. L. S. Rowe 


The munificent gift made to the 
nation by Edward W. Bok, in the 
establishment of the American Peace 
Award, is certain to arouse deep interest 
amongst the members of the Academy. 
The officers of the Academy are 
anxious that the terms of the Award be 
brought to the special attention of our 
members because of the fact that the 
conditions necessary for the mainte¬ 


nance of world peace have been the 
special study of so large a number of 
the Academy’s members. The officers 
of the Academy are convinced that our 
members are in a position to make an 
important contribution to the subject 
and take this opportunity to urge upon 
them the importance of cooperating in 
every possible way towards the success 
of the plan. 


807 


I 


/ 


The Plan for the American Peace Award 

Offering One Hundred Thousand Dollars ($100,000) 

This Award will be given to the author of the best 'practicable plan by which the United States may 


cooperate with other nations to achieve 

T HE Award is offered in the con¬ 
viction that the peace of the world 
is the problem of the people of the 
United States, and that a way can be 
found by which America’s voice can be 
made to count among the nations for 
peace and for the future welfare and 
integrity of the United States. 

THE PURPOSE of the Award is to 
give the American people from coast to 
coast a direct opportunity to evolve a 
plan that will be acceptable to many 
groups of our citizens, who, while now 
perhaps disagreeing as to the best 
method of international association, 
strongly desire to see the United States 
do its share in preventing war and in 
establishing a workable basis of cooper¬ 
ation among the nations of the earth. 

Four Subsidiary Awards 

Since the plan finally selected by the 
Jury may be a composite of more than 
one plan, there are also offered, in 
addition to the main award of one 
hundred thousand dollars ($100,000), 
second, third, fourth and fifth awards of 
five thousand dollars ($5,000) each for 
any plans or portion of plans used by 
the Jury of Award in a composite 
plan. 

If the Jury accepts one plan in full, 
making no additions to it from other 
plans, no subsidiary awards will be 
made. 

Conditions of Award 

Qualifications of Contestants 

The contest is open to every citizen 
of the United States, by birth or natu¬ 
ralization. 


and preserve the peace of the world 

Plans may be submitted either by 
individuals or by organizations of every 
kind, national, state or local. 

Scope of the Plan 

The winning plan must provide a 
practicable means whereby the United 
States can take its place and do its 
share toward preserving world peace, 
while not making compulsory the 
participation of the United States in 
European wars, if any such are, in the 
future, found unpreventable. 

The plan may be based upon the 
present covenant of the League of 
Nations or may be entirely apart from 
that instrument. 

Time and Manner of Payment of Award 

The purpose of the Award is twofold: 
first, to produce a plan; and secondly, 
to insure, so far as may be, that it will 
be put into operation. 

The Award is, therefore, to be made 
in two payments: fifty thousand dollars 
($50,000) will be paid to the author of 
the winning plan as soon as the Jury of 
Award has selected it. The second 
fifty thousand dollars ($50,000) will be 
paid to the author if and when the plan, 
in substance and intent, is approved by 
the United States Senate; or if and 
when the Jury of Award decides that 
an adequate degree of popular support 
has been demonstrated for the winning 
plan. 

The question of whether amendments 
which may be made in the Senate 
materially affect the intent of the plan 
submitted, and the acceptance or 
rejection of these amendments, are left 


308 


The Plan for the American Peace Award 


309 


entirely to the judgment of the Jury of 
Award. 

The second half of the Award or fifty 
thousand dollars ($50,000) shall not be 
deemed to have been won unless the 
conditions above mentioned as to the 
approval of the plan shall be fulfilled 
on or before March 4, 1925. 

The subsidiary awards are to be paid 
upon the same basis as the principal 
Award; that is, twenty-five hundred 
dollars ($2,500) will be paid to the 
author at the time the first fifty 
thousand dollars ($50,000) is paid, and 
the remaining twenty-five hundred 
dollars ($2,500) if and when the com¬ 
posite plan, in substance and intent, 
shall have been accepted by the Senate 
of the United States; or if and when the 
Jury of Award decides that an adequate 
degree of popular support has been 
demonstrated for the winning plan. 

Form of Plan 

Plans submitted should not be in the 
form of bills, resolutions, or treaties suitable 
for presentation to the Senate. 

The paper submitted may include not 
only the exposition of the plan, but also 
argument for it. 

A summary of not exceeding five hundred 
words must accompany every plan. 

Length 

The total number of words submitted, 
exclusive of the summary, must not exceed 
five thousand (5,000). 

Rules for Contestants 

Only one plan may be submitted by any 
one contestant. 

Manuscripts must be typewritten, and on 
only one side of the page. 

Manuscripts must not be rolled. 

They must not be accompanied by letters. 

They must not bear the name of the author 
or contain anything by which the author 
might be identified. Each manuscript must 
have attached to it a plain sealed envelope 
containing the author’s name and address. 
As^they are received, the manuscript and 
envelope will be marked, for identification, 


with the same number. The envelopes 
will not be opened until the Jury of Award 
has made its selections. Hence the receipt 
of manuscripts cannot be acknowledged. 

No manuscripts will be returned. No 
postage for the return of manuscripts 
should therefore be included by the sender. 

Time Limitation 

All manuscripts must be received at the 
office of the American Peace Award by 
twelve o’clock midnight on November 15, 
1923. Manuscripts received after that 
time cannot be considered. 

It is expected that the Jury will be able to 
announce the selection of a plan for the first 
part of the Award in time for the plan to be 
presented to the Senate early in 1924. 

Right of Publication 

The submission of any manuscript, 
whether or not it receives an Award, shall 
give to the Committee full rights to publish 
the same in such manner and at such time 
as it may choose. 

Cooperating Council 

Working in direct cooperation with 
the Policy Committee of the American 
Peace Award are the most prominent 
and effective organizations, civic, re¬ 
ligious, and economic, throughout the 
United States. 

A cooperating council has been 
formed for the American Peace Award, 
consisting of one delegate from each of 
these organizations. 

Jury of Award 

The personnel of the Jury of Award 
will be announced as soon after Septem¬ 
ber first as possible. 

Policy Committee 

The Policy Committee of the Ameri¬ 
can Peace Award consists of the 
following members: 

John W. Davis, former Ambassador to 

Great Britain, now President of the 

American Bar Association. 
Learned Hand, Judge of the United 


310 


The Annals of the American Academy 


States Court for the Southern 
District of New York since 1909. 

William H. Johnston, President of 
the International Association of Ma¬ 
chinists and executive officer of the 
Conference for Progressive Political 
Action. 

Esther Everett Lape, Member in 
Charge, writer. 

Nathan L. Miller, former Governor 
of New York State, State Controller 
and Judge of the Court of Appeals, 
now practicing law in New York 
City. 

Mrs. Gifford Pinchot, wife of the 
Governor of Pennsylvania, active in 
political life and many social welfare 
movements. 

Mrs. Ogden Reid, wife of the publisher 
of the New York Tribune and Vice- 
President of the New York Tribune, 
Inc. 

Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt, wife 


of the former Assistant Secretary of 
the Navy, who is now head of the 
American Construction Council; 
Vice-Chairman of the New York 
League of Women Voters. 

Henry L. Stimson, former Secretary 
of War and United States Attorney 
for the Southern District of New 
York, now a practicing lawyer. 
Melville E. Stone, former general 
manager, now counselor, of The 
Associated Press. 

Mrs. Frank A. Vanderlip, wife of the 
banker; Regional Director of the 
New York League of Women Voters. 
Cornelius N. Bliss, Jr., is the 
Treasurer of the Policy Committee. 

Please address all inquiries to: 

The American Peace Award, 

342 Madison Avenue, 

New York City. 


Book Department 


Dunaway, Wayland Fuller. History of 
the James River and Kanawha Company. 
Pp. 250. 

Winternitz, Robert. English Manual 
for Business. Pp. 96. Price, $1.00. 
Chicago: A. W. Shaw Company, 1923. 

Libby, Walter. The History of Medicine. 
Pp. xi, 427. Price, $3.00. Boston: 
Houghton Mifflin Company. 

DeKruif, Paul H. Our Medicine Men. 
Pp. viii, 237. Price, $1.75. New York: 
The Century Company. 

Considerable interest has been developing 
among the general laity in the fundamental 
problems of the historic professions. Wit¬ 
ness, by way of example, current discus¬ 
sions involving the law and the ministry. 

In view of its very great social importance, 
lay interest in the medical profession has 
been comparatively slow in manifesting 
itself. Here, however, are two books 
which may be taken as indicative of a 
growing public concern in this direction. 
Both are the work of non-medical men. 
One is a well-known educator and histo¬ 
rian, the other an eminent bacteriologist. 
Both volumes are written for the general 
reading public, in addition to any specific 
appeal to medical men. 

Professor Libby’s book fills a long-felt 
need for a short, well-written history of 
medicine, eligible to the general reader. 
Within the compass of four hundred pages, 
it sets forth the salient features in the his¬ 
tory of medicine from its obscure begin¬ 
nings in ancient civilizations down to the 
gains derived from the World War. After 
devoting four chapters to the foundations 
of medical knowledge and practise among 
the Egyptians and Babylonians, the Greeks, 
the Romans and the Arabs, the author 
proceeds to a review of the revival of anat¬ 
omy and surgery in the sixteenth century; 
thereafter devoting chapters (to enumerate 
but partially) to such topics as William 
Harvey and the revival of Physiology, 

311 


Comparative Anatomy and the work of 
John Hunter, Embryology and Karl 
Ernst Von Baer, Cellular Pathology, the 
founders of Bacteriology and Antiseptic 
Surgery, the history of Syphilis, and Pre¬ 
ventive Medicine in the tropics. 

Many of the chapters are almost encyclo¬ 
pedic. The reader is amazed repeatedly at 
the wealth of information compressed into 
a few pages. This compression of material 
is due, no doubt, to the fact that the book 
is the outcome of a series of lectures deliv¬ 
ered to third-year students in a medical 
college—an audience with considerable 
orientation in the field. Thus, while ob¬ 
taining a splendid bird’s-eye view of the 
development of the field, one cannot but 
wish that before having been put into book 
form for the general public, some of its 
features might have been somewhat ex¬ 
panded. 

The book is admirably conceived and 
excellently executed. While considerable 
information is included on the life and work 
of the outstanding person in each period, 
the continuity of the subject is everywhere 
emphasized. On the other hand, although 
impressed with the evolution of medical 
knowledge and practise, built up patiently 
and laboriously by many workers in many 
lands, one is amazed at times to discover 
how very old are some ideas emphasized at 
the present time. Thus the Greek histo¬ 
rian, Herodotus, in speaking of the Egyp¬ 
tian physicians of the fifth century, B.C., 
says: 

Medicine is practised among them on a plan 
of separation; each physician treats a single dis¬ 
order, and no more; thus the country swarms 
with medical practitioners, some undertaking to 
cure diseases of the eye, others of the head, 
others again of the teeth, others of the intestines, 
and some those which are not local. 

He also takes note of those which “have a 
persuasion that every disease to which men 
are liable is occasioned by the substances 
whereon they feed.” 

At the end of each chapter is a well- 
selected bibliography suggestive for further 
study, A short glossary of medical terms 


312 


The Annals of the American Academy 


would have enhanced the value of the vol¬ 
ume for the general reader. 

Our Medicine Men is an entirely different 
sort of a book. If Professor Libby cuts 
through his subject with the precision and 
rapidity of a surgeon, DeKruif resembles 
nothing so much as the old-time western 
cowboy, riding into town on a mad gallop, 
shooting and shouting as he goes. 

A bacteriologist sufficiently close to the 
medical profession to speak as one of the 
cognoscenti, and with a masterly command 
of the English language, he has written a 
series of essays in which he attacks most 
mercilessly the foibles, shams, inaccuracies 
and pretensions of medical practitioners. 

His fundamental insistence, maintained 
throughout more than two hundred pages 
of slashing rhetoric, is upon the distinction 
between the study of medicine as a scien¬ 
tific pursuit, and the art of healing. 

The physician should be venerated, not for 
supernatural knowledge or for scientific acumen, 
but for his understanding of men’s ills and 
troubles, for raising his patient’s morale, and 
for applying, as a technologist, the therapeutic 
and prophylactic discoveries furnished him by 
the small group of scientists who actually under¬ 
stand disease (p. 9). To tell the truth, the 
medical man, if he remains in the practise of his 
profession, must, by temperament and the 
demands of his work, lack the very qualities 
that are necessary to the investigator (p. 38). 

On the basis of this distinction, the 
author proceeds to indict medical educa¬ 
tion, which he points out is built upon the 
assumption that for the first two years all 
of the students are to become investigators 
of disease, while the last two years are 
devoted to hospital training entirely anti¬ 
thetical to the spirit of science. He pleads 
for a sharp distinction between the prac¬ 
tical sheep and the scientific goats, to be 
made at the very beginning of the course of 
instruction. 

A number of other matters incident to 
the practise of medicine—popular credu¬ 
lity, the passing of the general practition¬ 
er, implications of preventive medicine, 
health by moral fervor, exploitation by so- 
called specialists—are fearlessly discussed. 
Dr. DeKruif has written a brilliant, even 
if disturbing, book. While many readers, 
both within and without the profession. 


will dismiss it as the tirade of a radical, it 
would be well to consider carefully his 
criticisms. One must perhaps, in the end, 
agree with him that there is much in this 
ancient and honored profession that needs 
improvement. 

James H. S. Bossard. 

Woods, Robert A. and Kennedy, Al¬ 
bert J. The Settlement Horizon , A Na ¬ 
tional Estimate. Pp. 487. Price, $3.00. 
New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 
1922. 

The Settlement Horizon is the result of an 
extensive inquiry undertaken into the 
growth, development and achievements of 
the settlement movement of the United 
States under the direction of the National 
Association of Settlements. Its purpose 
has been not alone to give a record of actual 
accomplishments in the realm of usual 
settlement activities, but to supply also a 
broader estimate of the place and contri¬ 
bution of this movement in our national 
life. The book will thus be of value to two 
groups of readers,—to settlement workers 
as technicians, and to the students of nil 
types of social reform activities. 

To the settlement worker the book will 
prove a source book and manual for years 
to come regarding ways and means and 
proved methods regarding all such matters 
as boys’ and girls’ clubs, educational 
classes, vacation work, recreational prac¬ 
tices, etc. That wise and sound methods 
for developing these numerous procedures 
have now been established will not be 
doubted by the careful reader of this 
volume. 

But it is to the book’s wider appeal that 
attention should be called. Mr. Woods’ 
contribution as a sociologist has as yet 
received scant recognition in this country, 
and even in this study the essential kernel 
of his “neighborhood idea” is somewhat 
obscured both by the length and by the 
rather indirect method of presentation em¬ 
ployed. However, the major thesis around 
which this whole book develops is the 
discovery that in urban working class sec¬ 
tions the proper conduct of such civic activ¬ 
ities as health work, education, recreation, 
and various civic improvements depends 
upon the vitality of local spirit and organi- 


Book Department 


313 


zation among neighbors. The lesson is 
clear that responsibility for the effective 
conduct of these activities is shouldered by 
no one if it is not shouldered by the rank 
and file of families up and down the street. 
Insistence upon the importance of neighbor¬ 
hood, ward, and precinct organization will 
perhaps not strike the contemporary stu¬ 
dent of political organization as a new note. 
Yet the emphasis which theorists like 
Bryce, Duguit, Croly, Cole, and Laski have 
put upon this truth was antedated by 
several years in Mr. Woods’ teaching of it 
as developed out of his actual experience. 

The book as a whole is written in a tem¬ 
perate spirit and care has been taken not to 
claim too much for settlement work. In¬ 
deed, it is definitely true that too little is 
claimed for the creative activities in the last 
twenty years of the authors themselves, 
who modestly allow their own share in the 
settlement movement’s growth to r.emain 
in the background. 

Perhaps, however, there is not sufficient 
recognition explicitly given to the unsolved 
problems of city life. The book would 
have given a fairer estimate had it included 
a chapter on some such subjects as vital 
problems which the settlement has dis¬ 
closed and been unable effectually to help 
in solving. There are such problems, and 
they remain unsolved, not because of the 
settlement workers’ incapacity, but be¬ 
cause of the size of the forces—economic 
and psychological—in which modern soci¬ 
ety is gripped. 

In conclusion, this is unquestionably one 
of the three or four outstanding contribu¬ 
tions to sociological writing in the last 
decade, and it deserves a wider study at 
the hands of students of political organiza¬ 
tion and educational methods than it is 
likely to have, in part because of its diffi¬ 
culties of style, in part because the problem 
of the technique of publicity for their ideas 
has never been solved by settlement work¬ 
ers. Their influence upon public affairs 
has been tremendous in ways unknown to 
the public, but there is still a problem of 
public education regarding the discoveries 
of settlements about working class life 
which demands the further attention of its 
supporters. This is, of course, a problem 
also for the publicity director of the Russell 


Sage Foundation, and it is to be hoped that 
the book will not simply find its way onto a 
few library shelves along with the other 
uniformly bound olive green studies of this 
foundation. The book deserves the widest 
sort of recognition at the hands of all who 
are interested in fundamental social re¬ 
habilitation and growth. 

Ordway Tead. 

Webb, Sidney and Beatrice. The Decay 
of Capitalist Civilization. Pp. xvii and 
242. Price, $1.75. New York: Har- 
court. Brace and Company. 

Mr. and Mrs. Webb have written at a 
time when their study is of peculiar interest. 
Only a few days before the reviewer read 
their book a resolution was presented in 
Parliament by Mr. Snowden which calls 
for extensive socialization in Great Britain, 
and will be debated in the near future. If 
there were no other evidence of the critical 
situation in England, such a debate would 
in itself be sufficient. 

But other indications abound. Con¬ 
tinued unemployment, depressed trade, 
idle shipping, low wages and declining 
profits would be serious if due merely to a 
general business depression that will in 
time pass. But when to an unusually 
s.evere business depression one adds the 
effects of persistent friction in Europe, and 
the rivalry of other industrial countries 
which has been of increasing importance to 
Great Britain for the last fifty years, the 
picture becomes a dark one. Is capitalism 
weakening, especially in its stronghold? 

The authors make two explanations 
that call for notice. The preface reminds 
the reader that the book is not “construc¬ 
tive,” and refers to other volumes for plans 
of reconstruction. At the end of the vol¬ 
ume they point out that “though we have 
been active members of the Labor and 
Socialist movement for over thirty years, 
we have never before framed an indictment 
of the capitalist system.” These explana¬ 
tions should not be overlooked, for the 
reader should not commit the error of 
thinking that the authors are merely 
vociferous critics of existing institutions. 

There is presented the usual socialist 
indictment under four heads. It is 
charged that under capitalism (1) the bulk 


314 


The Annals of the American Academy 


of the people live in penury; (2) this penury 
is “rendered more hideous and humiliating 
by the relative comfort and luxury of the 
proprietary class and by the shameless 
idleness of some of its members;” (3) the 
proletarian masses lack personal freedom; 
and (4) the very basis of the capitalist 
system is scientifically unsound. Although 
capitalism did more good than evil until 
about the middle of the nineteenth century, 
and the balance was doubtful during the 
latter half of the century, the drawbacks 
now outweigh the advantages. It is now 
failing not only because of its inequitable 
distribution of wealth, but because under 
it productivity is curtailed. Moreover, 
“its exclusive reliance on the motive of 
pecuniary gain to individual owners” 
makes it “inimical to national morality 
and peace; in fact, to civilization itself.” 

Many critics who are not Socialists will 
join with the Webbs in emphasizing the 
failures of the past and the problems of the 
present and the perils of the future. The 
difficulty lies in placing responsibility. 
Both the Socialists and the most reaction¬ 
ary of their opponents often err in con¬ 
ceiving of capitalism as something that 
changes but little. Against this conception 
the authors guard themselves, but do so 
inadequately. Their definition of capital¬ 
ist civilization and much of their argument 
indicates their appreciation of its changes, 
but the reader is left at the end of the vol¬ 
ume wdthout a sufficient realization of the 
many modifications that have come with 
government control, works councils, con¬ 
sumers’ cooperatives, etc. 

Nor is the case strengthened by the con¬ 
tention that so many of the world’s ills 
are due to capitalism. Poverty, hunger, 
overpopulation, national and other hatreds 
have not been peculiar to any age or any 
form of economic organization, nor will 
they quickly vanish. The pessimistic 
forecasts of Rathenau and the more careful 
analyses of Tawney carry greater convic¬ 
tion to the careful reader. 

That sweeping changes have taken place 
in the last century is clear, but that many 
more must come is equally certain. The 
world is facing an economic impasse from 
which extrication is not easy. To disagree 
in many particulars with Mr. and Mrs. 


Webb is not to endorse the view's of the 
reactionaries. Instead the reviewer hopes 
this volume w ill be widely read. Its mes¬ 
sage is forcefully presented and it should 
aid materially in rousing us to a realization 
of the difficulties of our present position, 
and to the necessity of a more rapid ad¬ 
justment to the changing conditions in a 
dynamic world. These adjustments should 
come more rapidly, but to direct them 
w'isely calls for all the intelligence and 
enthusiasm that can be brought to the 
task. 

Ernest Minor Patterson. 

McVey, Frank L. Modern Industrialism 

(second and revised edition of 1922). 

Pp. 358. New' York: Appleton and Co. 

The author essays, in this comparatively 
small space, to explain modern industrial 
or economic society historically and analyt¬ 
ically, and also to sketch the economic 
problems arising therein. Part I consists 
of five chapters of economic history on 
Britain, the United States, Germany and 
the Orient; Part II, on “Industry,” is de¬ 
voted to extractive industries, transporta¬ 
tion, manufacture, forms of industrial 
organization (including labor), commercial 
and financial institutions, and taxation of 
industry; while Part III treats of “Admin¬ 
istration,” tracing the trend of state regu¬ 
lation from laissez-faire to government 
ownership and “The Widening Circle of 
Democracy in Industry,”—which last title 
covers questions of international rela¬ 
tions in regard to raw materials, as well 
as topics connected with labor and social¬ 
ism. 

Although there is abundant need, in 
economic teaching (wdiether of sophomores 
or of “the general reader”), of good liter¬ 
ature which combines historical, geograph¬ 
ical and descriptive materials on industry 
to make principles or theory take hold of 
more concrete ideas than the average stu¬ 
dent has, I fear this book cannot be strongly 
recommended for the purpose. That the 
bulk of it was w ritten before 1904, drawing 
upon the old Industrial Commission and 
other sources now somewhat antiquated, 
and that specialists can readily pick flaw's 
in every page, are not particularly damag¬ 
ing matters, for the problems of monopoly 


Book Department 


315 


in business management and labor, and 
the corresponding suggestions of more or 
less participation by government, present 
today aspects not fundamentally different 
from those of twenty years ago; while in a 
broad introductory survey, hairsbreadth 
accuracy is not indispensable. But the 
following defects are apparent: 

(1) Certain mechanical aids, now rea¬ 
sonably to be expected, are missing, 
such as sectional headings, tables, charts, 
and maps. No doubt graphic representa¬ 
tions are expensive, yet they stamp in 
important points with such a saving of 
time that a publisher will neglect them at 
his peril. 

(2) The revision, though evidencing 
much honest labor in almost every chapter, 
leaves some anachronisms showing through, 
—for instance, the reference to motor plow¬ 
ing, and the unrevised figures on railroad 
and blast furnace equipment of “today.” 
Three new chapters have been added,—on 
the economic history of Japan and the 
Orient (an excellent chapter), on taxation, 
and “The Widening Circle of Democracy.” 
It will still be felt, however, that there are 
important subjects, such as business cycles, 
which receive almost no treatment, and 
that other matters, such as government 
regulation and ownership, are treated too 
sketchily as to the last twenty years. Of 
course the scope of the work makes thorough¬ 
going revision more difficult than the orig¬ 
inal writing. 

(3) Such subject-matter might perhaps 
be made more interesting to the beginner 
by larger use of concrete illustrations, 
perhaps of anecdotes. The letters of 
Washington, used in Chapter III, are 
examples of what I mean. (In this case 
the dates of the letters would be helpful.) 
The style of the present volume, as of most 
in its general class, is all too like that of the 
dry economic writings from which its 
materials are drawn, and is somewhat 
worse than the latter on account of the 
abridgment. 

(4) The background of economic theory 
is weak. Before reading ten pages one 
notices that statistics in dollars, given to 
show “progress” of one sort or another, 
are not corrected for changes in the price 
level; these and other comparative figures 


are not thrown into relative form by per 
capita calculations; public goods are called 
free goods; collective bargaining is said un¬ 
equivocally to increase the share of the 
product which goes to labor; depressions 
are attributed to “overproduction”; no 
clear theory of the incidence of taxation is 
betrayed; and we find frequently sentences 
as undiscriminating as 

The English farmer possesses great home 
markets, but he is hampered by high rents, 
large and discriminating transportation charges, 
the heavy cost of fertilizers and old leases that 
keep him at work in the old agriculture. 

True, the author is not pretending to offer 
economic principles; but he will not accom¬ 
plish his avowed aim of helping us to under¬ 
stand the existing industrial situation if he 
uses poor theoretical cement to bind his 
historical and technological bricks. It is 
the common error, as I view it, of giving 
economic theory, history, description and 
geography in separate doses instead of 
weaving them into the frame of theory, 
which makes them intelligible as a whole. 

These criticisms are considerably counsels 
of perfection. The revision does in fact 
give a new lease of life to a broad, 
brief, generally competent and sympathetic 
treatment of industrial organization and 
policy. It will be a valuable instrument in 
arousing and inforcing wider interest in the 
grave problems in this field. 

Z. C. Dickinson, 
University of Minnesota. 

Carroll, Mollie Rat. Labor and Poli¬ 
tics. Pp. xix, 206. Price, $2.00. Bos¬ 
ton: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1923. 

At a time when the Farmer-Labor Party, 
stimulated by its recent election of a United 
States Senator, is reaching out aggressively 
for new victories, the appearance of Dr. 
Carroll’s study of labor and politics coin¬ 
cides with an interesting modem develop¬ 
ment of labor in politics. 

This volume does not, however, deal 
with the program and activities of the 
Farmer-Labor Party, though it does refer 
to its creation in 1918 as “another sign of 
change.” It makes no mention of the 
early labor parties of 1834 and 1872. It 
draws no comparisons from the experiences 


316 


The Annals of the American Academy 


of labor parties in other countries such as 
the British Labor Party. The book—a 
Hart, Schaffner and Marx prize essay in 
economics—confines itself to a presentation 
and analysis of the political and legislative 
policies of the American Federation of 
Labor under the leadership of Mr. Gompers. 
“For the purposes of this study,” the 
author explains, “the official decisions of 
the conventions, the actions of the national 
committees, and the expressions of Mr. 
Gompers and the groups of officials working 
with him,” are accepted as “authority.” 
The scope of the study is plainly indicated 
in the sub-title. “The Attitude of The 
American Federation of Labor Toward 
Legislation and Politics.” 

Dr. Carroll “is in agreement with the 
Federation that a political labor party 
would probably not be most effective in 
promoting the interests of labor,” but she 
“believes that the Federation must develop 
constructive in place of its negative policies 
as regards legislation, research and higher 
education, and production.” 

Beginning with a brief discussion of the 
function of trade unions in a democracy, in 
which current criticisms of unionism and of 
the Federation’s policy are reviewed, the 
book plunges quickly into the history and 
progress of the Federation. Five illumi¬ 
nating chapters set forth the development 
during the past forty years of the Fed¬ 
eration’s political and legislative poli¬ 
cies. Early campaign disappointments, the 
writer finds, had their influence in turning 
the organization away from independent 
political action and into its now familiar 
emphasis upon economic ^methods, with 
political activity upon the non-partisan 
basis of “reward your friends; punish your 
enemies.” In its attitude toward the 
intervention of the state, the Federation 
has favored protective legislation for spe¬ 
cial working groups—children, women, 
seamen and government employees—and 
legislation for workers generally, such as 
workmen’s accident compensation, to¬ 
gether with general social legislation, in¬ 
cluding regulation of large industries. 
With respect to protective measures par¬ 
ticularly, the author notes that the Fed¬ 
eration’s endorsement has been of aid in 
putting through much of the legislation, 


although the initiative behind the bills and 
the campaigns of public education were the 
work of social service organizations. 

In the third part of the book, dealing "with 
the law and politics in the Federation’s 
program, the author discusses the status 
of the worker before the law, with the 
suggestion that 

the policy of the Federation has been largely 
negative. There has been no attempt to estab¬ 
lish the legal right of trade unions to existence 
and to enlarged activity comparable to the 
British Trade Disputes Act of 1906. 

The struggle against injunction abuses is 
reviewed and labor’s distrust of the courts 
noted. A chapter on the Federation’s 
attitude toward political party action out¬ 
lines its defense against Socialist criticisms 
and its reason for continuing its old policy, 
despite signs of unrest in the ranks of labor 
such as that manifested in the creation of 
the Farmer-Labor Party. 

Dr. Carroll concludes the volume with an 
analysis of the implications, the possibili¬ 
ties, and the limitations of the Federation’s 
program. She agrees that “the function of 
an economic organization is not the usurpa¬ 
tion of the political field” and finds that 
the Federation, on its own ground, has no 
program that looks to the future. Future 
success of the Federation, the author sug¬ 
gests, will be tested by its progress along 
the lines of awakening interest in efficiency 
in production and in research. 

Labor and Politics is a well-planned, 
concise and sympathetic survey of the 
political policy of the American Federation 
of Labor. It is a helpful handbook for the 
special student as well as an easily read and 
illuminating aid to the general reader, in 
reaching an understanding of important 
forces that have a bearing upon social 
progress. 

Montgomery, J. K. Maintenance of the 
Agricultural Labour Supply in England 
and Wales During the War. Pp. 121. 
Price, $.60. Rome: Printing Office of 
International Institute of Agriculture. 

The subject of agricultural labour supply 
is of both an academic and an applied inter¬ 
est, particularly in the United States, where 
there is a general labour shortage on the 


Book Department 


317 


farms of approximately 20 per cent. In 
Pennsylvania the reports of the Depart¬ 
ment of Agriculture show a 20 per cent 
shortage, April 1, 1923, compared with a 
3 per cent shortage in 1921 of like date. 
While the incentive to do farm labour and 
the methods followed in England during the 
war were not typical of the present time, 
yet there is much in this report that has a 
bearing on any critical agricultural labour 
situation. 

The effect of the measures for increasing 
the area of arable land is shown by the 
following figures: “10,998,250 acres in 
1914; 10,965,710 acres in 1915; 11,051,100 
acres in 1916; 11,246,110 acres in 1917; 
12,398,640 acres in 1918.” The pamphlet 
does not give the figures as to the normal 
number of farm labourers required, but 
probably comparison will be facilitated by 
considering Pennsylvania, which has ap¬ 
proximately 12,000,000 acres of improved 
land, divided into 202,000 farms. There¬ 
fore, the farm labour needs of Pennsylvania 
will somewhat typify their requirements. 

The subject is discussed under the fol¬ 
lowing general headings: 

1. The Agricultural Labourer and Mili¬ 

tary Service. 

2. Soldier Labour. 

3. Prisoners of War and Interned Civil¬ 

ians. 

4. Women Landworkers. 

5. Some Other Sources of Labour. 

6. Minimum Wages for Agricultural 

Labour. 

The necessity of retaining a sufficient 
force on the farm to maintain an increased 
production was clearly recognized early in 
the war, and had its first evidence in con¬ 
nection with the selective process of enroll¬ 
ment for service. This was reflected by an 
official act for retaining certain classes of 
labour on farms, replacing of labour, and 
the payment of minimum wages for farm 
help. The plans for making a selection as 
to who should be retained were modified 
as the necessity for additional men for the 
Army, and also as the vital need of in¬ 
creased food production developed, which 
generally took the form of attested and 
late certified occupations. In most cases 
the certification did not apply until the 


labourer reached the age of 25 or 30. 
Agricultural occupations certified as of 
national importance under the Military 
Act of 1916, were as follows: 

1. Agricultural Enginemen and Mechan¬ 

ics. 

2. Farm Workers: 

a. Farm bailiff, grieve, steward. 

b. Farm beastman, byreman, cattle¬ 

man, stockman, yardman. 

c. Farm carter, horseman, plough¬ 

man, teamster, wagoner. 

d. Farm hind (if foreman or plough¬ 

man). 

e. Farm servant (if foreman or 

ploughman) (Scotland). 

f. Farm shepherd. 

g. Thatcher. 

3. Farmers and Market Gardeners. 

4. Stud Attendants. 

This pretty generally represents the 
classes considered most vital. The follow¬ 
ing further additions were added in 1918, 
subject always to the action of the proper 
board: 

a. Rabbit catchers, rat and mole catch¬ 

ers, vermin killers. 

b. Hedgers, ditchers, and drainers. 

c. Men wholly employed on individual 

agricultural estates in the following 
occupations: Agricultural masons, 
bricklayers, carpenters, joiners, 
slaters, and men engaged in fencing 
or in making walls or gates. 

d. Men engaged in looking after ma¬ 

chinery for pumping stations, etc., 
on agricultural estates. 

e. Sheep dippers, shearers, and drovers. 

f. Man wholly engaged in willow farming 

and withy growing. 

g. Managers of sets of threshing tackle. 

h. Men engaged in flax cultivation. 

A minimum standard of labour needs 
suggested, without definite adherence 
thereto, was as follows; 

One skilled able-bodied man or lad 
(wherever possible not of military age) 
for each of the following: 

Each team of horses required to cul¬ 
tivate the land. 

Every 20 cows in milk, when the as¬ 
sistance of women or boys was available. 


318 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Every 50 head of stall or yard stock, 
when auxiliary feeding was resorted to 
and the assistance of women or boys was 
available. 

Every 200 sheep, exclusive of lambs, 
grazed on enclosed lands. 

Every 800 sheep running on mountain 
or hill pasture. 

The administrative bodies were such as 
might be anticipated, including local 
boards of agriculture, carrying out the 
provisions or rulings made by national, 
military, and agricultural bodies, modified 
as experience and exigencies demanded. 

Soldiers were recognized as a promising 
source of labour, and, beginning with 1915, 
a provision was made for furloughs, mostly 
from 14 to 30 days. They were granted 
under quite a variety of conditions, particu¬ 
larly for skilled farm labour and for rush 
periods of the year. The following figures 
indicate the extent to which this was 
carried out: 

1916, 27,000 released for harvest. 

1917, 30,000 supplied for Spring harvest. 

It is estimated that by August of 1918 
there were 70,000 men in agricultural 
companies. In the latter part of the war, 
special attention was given to the training 
of tractor drivers and threshing tackle 
men; 4,093 were trained in schools for this 
purpose. 

Soldier labour was found to give general 
satisfaction, as they were made available 
at a time when the rush of work was on, 
and many of them selected for skill in farm 
work. 

Quite an extensive use was made of 
prisoners of war and interned civilians. 
First they were furnished in groups of 75, 
placed at depots and working within a 
three-mile radius, for the customary hours 
of labour in the neighborhood. A develop¬ 
ment was made toward smaller groups, 
being reduced to as low as 30 in the latter 
stages. 

At the beginning of September, 1919, when 
repatriation was decided upon, there were em¬ 
ployed 19,319 prisoners going out daily to work 
from 321 agricultural camps, 1,735 prisoners 
boarded out with farmers, 1,008 prisoners sent 
out from parent camps, and 3,041 prisoners 


working in migratory gangs. The total number 
employed at that date was 25,103. 

The normal rate of pay for prisoners of 
war was to be Id. per hour. The charges 
fixed for prisoners’ labour to be paid to the 
military authorities ranged from 4s. 6d. up, 
for a day of 10 hours. In general this class 
of labour was satisfactory. 

Many women customarily worked on 
the land before the war, statistics of which 
do not appear suitable for comparison. 

A move to enlist the women for farm 
work met with a number of drawbacks, 
such as: Prejudice on the part of the 
women that work on the land was degrad¬ 
ing; prejudice of the farmer against women 
labourers; difficulties in finding living 
accommodations; lack of suitable clothing, 
etc. All these were overcome by patriot¬ 
ism and demonstrations of what women 
could actually do. 

In 1917 the Women’s Land Army was 
organized, which played a prominent part 
in later developments. They had three 
methods of training: 

1. Each farmer training his workers and 

not paying while in training. 

2. Farmers training two or three work¬ 

ers at a practice farm, and passing 

them on as skilled workers. 

3. Training at an organized centre, 

which proved the most satisfactory. 

They were given six weeks’ training on 
either special lines, or general lines of farm 
work. The kinds of work done are indi¬ 
cated by the following summary: 

In August, 1918, returns were obtained regard¬ 
ing the occupations of 12,657 women of the Land 
Army, and it was found that 5,734 were em¬ 
ployed as milkers, 293 as tractor drivers, 3,971 as 
field workers, 635 as carters, 260 as ploughmen, 
84 as thatchers, and 21 as shepherds, while the 
remainder were occupied in various other kinds 
of agricultural work. 

Women showed special aptitude for 
handling the livestock, especially in the 
rearing of young animals, and dairying 
where sanitation was particularly impor¬ 
tant, and all the lighter branches of field 
work, such as market gardening. They 
were also quite successful as drivers of 
motor tractors, 


Book Department 


319 


Starting in with a handicap of prejudice 
and skepticism, the women, through their 
perseverance and ability, won credit and a 
real place in the field of agricultural labour. 

Other sources consisted largely of refu¬ 
gees, particularly Belgian and Danish, 
although these were not nearly as great in 
number as other sources. The employment 
of boys during the harvest season was 
highly developed by 1918, when 15,000 
were working out, and they proved quite 
apt and helpful. 

It was found desirable to provide a mini¬ 
mum wage as an inducement for agricul¬ 
tural labour to stay on the land. This 
resulted in the Corn Production Act of 
1917, which provided a minimum wage and 
a Wages Board to carry out the provisions 
of the Act. The wage reports varied for 
different operations. The usual hours per 
week were 54 in summer and 48 in winter, 
with an extra charge for overtime. Mini¬ 
mum weekly wage ran chiefly between 35 s. 
and 42s. per week, for ordinary male work¬ 
ers, varying with the locality and age of the 
worker. 

Thus it appears that on an arable land 
area in extent similar to the improved land 
in Pennsylvania, there was employed at 
different times 70,000 soldiers, 30,000 
prisoners, 300,000 women, and 15,000 boys, 
or a total land army of 415,000, which 
would certainly be a tremendous factor in 
the handling of the arable land. 

John M. McKee. 

Leites, K. Recent Economic Developments 
in Russia. Edited by Harald Wester- 
gaard. Pp. 240. Oxford: The Claren¬ 
don Press, 1922. 

This volumte contains three monographs 
on the economic effects of the war on the 
belligerent countries, prepared under the 
direction of Professor J. B. Clark of 
the Division of Economics and History, of 
the Carnegie Endowment for International 
Peace. The first is entitled, “General 
Effect of the World War on the Economic 
Life of Russia Prior to the Bolshevik Revo¬ 
lution”; the second, “Results of the Eco¬ 
nomic Policy of the Bolsheviks”; the third, 
“Economic Life in Soviet Russia, 1920.” 

The sources are official reports and de¬ 
bates, and articles in such Soviet publica¬ 


tions as Izvestia, Pravda, and Economic Life , 
the organ of the Supreme Council of Na¬ 
tional Economy. There is no doubt that 
this is the fullest account in English of the 
nature and outworking of the Bolshevik 
economic policies down to February, 1921. 
The New Economic Policy was announced 
just after the completion of this investiga¬ 
tion and hence finds no place here. 

The materials assembled in this volume 
are invaluable for the economist and con¬ 
stitute a crushing indictment of the com¬ 
petency of the rash men who took Russian 
society in their hands and endeavored to 
“mould it nearer to the heart’s desire.” 
Communism as opposed to private capital¬ 
ism has nowhere gotten such a black eye as 
it gets from the facts marshalled in this 
book. It is plain that minds too few and 
ill-equipped were charged with energizing 
and directing the 4,400 nationalized con¬ 
cerns in Russia. The Bolsheviks are not 
lacking in natural or political ability, but 
few of them possess the specialized ability 
for conducting successfully the enterprises 
committed to their direction. 

It would be well to refer college students 
to this volume in order that from it they 
might derive a vivid sense of the role of 
capital in modern production. Without a 
flow of capital from the more advanced 
countries, Russian industry and transport 
are in the plight of a diver who no longer 
gets air from the surface. He suffers slow 
asphyxiation. 

While the author is a conscientious 
scholar, it is a pity that he sets out to prove 
a case. He paints his picture with pigments 
furnished only by the Bolsheviks, but he 
uses the sombre shades, never their 
brighter tints, although, in fact, there were 
minor successes in the economic campaign 
of the Bolsheviks. Furthermore, the 
author does not give any indication of the 
part that Denikin’s devastations and the 
tight blockade played in the economic ruin 
of Russia. 

Nor has he escaped being fooled by some 
of the anti-Bolshevik propaganda. Thus 
he is wrong in characterizing the July, 
1917, rising in Petrograd as a Bolshevik 
attempt to seize power; in attributing the 
failure of the Liberty Loan of the summer of 
1917 to Bolshevism instead of to the pro- 


320 


The Annals of the American Academy 


found war-weariness of the people; in 
exaggerating the role of the Chinese coolies 
in quelling insurrections against the Soviet 
Government; in charging serious sabotage 
to the railway workers and officials in 1917; 
and in attributing the 50 per cent larger 
yield on the estates as compared with the 
peasant fields to better tillage, whereas it 
is a well-known fact that at the time of 
emancipation the lords put off the serfs 
with the poorer land. 

So, while we are grateful to Mr. Leites, 
we should be more grateful were he less 
swayed by hostility to the Bolsheviks. 

Edward Alsworth Ross. 

Cassel, Gustav. The World's Monetary 
Problems. Two Memoranda. Pp. 154. 
Price, $1.50. New York: E. P. Dutton 
and Company. 

This is another printing of Professor 

CasseFs valuable survevs of world inone- 

«/ 

tary problems. The first was originally 
prepared for the International Financial 
Conference in Brussels in 1920, and the 
second for the Financial Committee of the 
League of Nations for their meeting in 
September, 1921. Both of these documents 


are among the most important contribu¬ 
tions to monetary discussions since the 
close of the war, and should be read by all 
students of the subject. 

E. M. Patterson. 

Birck, L. V. The Theory of Marginal 
Value. Pp. 351. Price $6.00. New 
York: E. P. Dutton & Co. 

The author is professor of economics at 
the University of Copenhagen, and the vol¬ 
ume is a translation from the Danish. 
Those who delight in marginal utility 
dialectics will probably revel in its refine¬ 
ments. Those who seriously question the 
value of such analyses will find it weari¬ 
some. This does not mean that the work 
of the Austrian school and its followers is to 
be decried as entirelv futile. On the con- 
trary, their work has been immensely 
valuable. Abstract analyses of subjective 
prices and hypothetical normal markets 
and elaborate mathematical formulae 
based on them are of so little importance 
today compared w r ith work along other 
lines, that treatises like this will probably 
receive but little attention. 

E. M. Patterson. 


Index 


Acosta, Senor Julia, 211. 

Act Scott (Canada), 225. 

Adams, Lynn G. Police Officer’s Difficulties in 
Enforcing Liquor Laws, 196-200. 

Aliens, Power of, 170, 171. 

Alcohol: amount consumed prior to prohibition, 
34; attitude of employers toward use, 108; 
danger of use of to specialized labor, 108; 
drug effects of, 9-11; false stimulancy of, 5; 
fear complex, 12; handicaps of, 7; hospital re¬ 
ports on, 11; importance of, 206; influence of 
modern inventions in prohibition of, 102-8; in¬ 
sidious effect of, 9; moderate use of, 5; temp¬ 
tation of, 4; use of by workingmen, 110, 111; 
vicious effect of, 3. 

Alcoholic drink: prohibitive use of in machine 
operations, 102; vs. intoxicating beverages, 
73-5. 

Alton, conditions in industries in, 176. 

American ulsiness: cyclical movement of, 289; 
managers lack of plan, 289; necessity for re¬ 
straint in, 290; planning, value of, 289; rate of 
expansion, 289, 290. 

American Expansion and Industrial Stabil¬ 
ity. Henry S. Dennison, 289-90. 

American Peace Award, The, 307-10. 

American workingmen, immigrants replace, 177. 

Anderson revelations, 31. 

Anti-Saloon League, 33, 34, 37, 76. 

Anti-Saloon League: accomplishments of, 282; 
annual meeting of, 281; beginning of, 279; 
Committee on Resolutions, 141; enlistment 
through pretense, 39; organization of, 279-80; 
personnel of, 281; relation between nation and 
state, 280; support of, 280; varied representa¬ 
tion on, 282; wrongs of, 41. 

Anti-Saloon League, The Why and What? 
Harry M. Chalfant, 279-83. 

Authority, breakdown of, 8. 

Association Against the Prohibition Amendment: 
three fold object of, 161; work in New York 
of, 162. 

Astor, Lady. English Law Relating to the 
Sale of Intoxicating Liquors, The, 265-78. 

Beck, Solicitor General, 52. 

Beer: amount of home brewed, 138; effect of, 79; 
prejudice to the name, 79; present condition, 
96; return of saloon, 99; three per cent; diffi¬ 
culties improving opinions, 94, 95; three per 
cent, intoxicating; proof of, 93, 94; three per 
cent; result if legalized, 99. 

Beer and light wine: activities of organization 
for, 162. 


Beer Revenue obtainable, 79. 

Benedict, Francis C., 9. 

Benge, Eugene J. Effect of Prohibition on 
Industry from the Viewpoint of an Employ¬ 
ment Manager, 110-20. 

Bethlehem Steel Company, 105. 

Bismarck, fight of against Socialist movement, 
298. 

Boyce, Cyril D. Prohibition in Canada, 225-9. 

Bratt System, 214. 

Breweries, 206. 

Business; farmers and, 292; measure of cyclical 
movement of (Statistics), 294; men and econ¬ 
omists, 295; men, responsibility of, 291; 
present status of, 293; relation of labor to 
cycle, 292; sentiment, 292, 293. 

Business Men and the Business Cycle. C. H. 
Crennan, 291-5. 

Buttermilk, analysis of, 91, 92. 

Canons of Journalism, 305-6. 

Capper, Arthur. Politics in the Enforcement 
of the Liquor Laws, 155-64. 

Chalfant, Harry M. Anti-Saloon League, 
The Why and What? 279-83. 

Cherrington, Ernest E., 141. 

Cherrington, Ernest H. World-Wide Prog¬ 
ress Toward Prohibition Legislation, 208- 
24. 

Church: need of able men for, 47; in politics, 
37. 

Cider, unrestricted sale of, 137. 

Citizenship, relation of health to, 7. 

Civil War, increase in drunkenness after, 279. 

Comments on Prohibition by a Lumberman 
and Miner. T. D. Stiles, 129-32. 

Constitution of 1789, 44, 45. 

Constitution, authority of, 8. 

Consumption of Alcoholic Beverages, The. 
Hugh F. Fox, 137-44. 

Crennan, C. H. Business Men and the Busi¬ 
ness Cycle, 291-5. 

Crim, John W. H., 53. 

Curtis, Mr. George Ticknor, 45, 46. 

Curtis Publishing Company, 112. 

Dana, Richard Henry, 169. 

Declaration of Independence, reason for, 43. 

Dennison, Henry S. American Expansion and 
Industrial Stability, 289-90. 

Disease, preventable amount, 4. 

Drug companies, formation of fake, 196, 197. 

Drunkenness, relief for, 77. 

Dunkin Act (Canada), 231. 


22 


321 



322 


The Annals of the American Academy 


Edge, Senator Walter E. Non-Effectiveness 
of the Volstead Act, The, 67-83. 

Effect of Prohibition on Industry from 
the Viewpoint of an Employment Mana¬ 
ger, The. Eugene J. Benge, 110-20. 

Efficiency movement, 110. 

Eighteenth Amendment an Infringement of 
Liberty, The. Hon. Henry S. Priest, 39-47. 

Eighteenth Amendment: a sumptuary measure, 
42; courses of action regarding, 193, 194; court 
rulings of, 197, 198; effect of on Great Britain, 
148; evasion of, 197; existingenforcement of, 16; 
faults in, 48, 49; faults of, 41; forceful opinions 
regarding, 16-24; general disregard of, 50; 
intent of, 67; lenient court action, 196; ma¬ 
jority against, 49; public opinion in favor of, 
172; purpose of, 50; question of foreign vessels 
within United States territorial waters, 148, 
149; radical change in government by, 44; re¬ 
moval from politics necessary, 163; suggestions 
as to, 51; suggested repeal of, 65; United 
States Government prior to, 43; ways to en¬ 
force, 285; what Pennsylvania police records 
show since, 196. 

Eliot, Dr. Charles W., opinion of, 90. 

Emperor William II, creation of worker’s pro¬ 
tective laws by, 298. 

Employment Managers, views of, regarding pro¬ 
hibition, 112. 

Employment Service Act of 1922 (Germany), 
303. 

English Law Relating to the Sale of In¬ 
toxicating Liquors, The. Lady Astor, 265 
-78. 

Federal Government, exceeded its limits, 42. 

Federal service, demoralization of, 203, 204. 

Fisher, Irving, 111. 

Fisk, Eugene Lyman. Relationship of Alcohol 
to Society and to Citizenship, The, 1-14. 

Fiske, John, 30. 

Fox, Hugh F. Consumption of Alcoholic Bev¬ 
erages, The, 137-44. 

Frankel, Emil. Germany’s New Labor 
Legislation, 296-304. 

Frankfurter, Felix. National Policy for 
Enforcement of Prohibition, A, 193-5. 

Franklin, Fabian. What’s Wrong with the 
Eighteenth Amendment? 48-51. 

French Revolution, 52. 

German Constitution, incorporation of new, 301, 
303. 

German military machine, collapse of, 299. 

Germany’s New Labor Legislation. Emil 
Frankel, 296-304. 

Graham and McConnel Case, 168, 169. 

Grand Jury, action of, 197. 

Grape crop, increasing problems of, 139. 

Great Britain, liquor conditions in, 79. 


Haynes, Commissioner, 80, 137. 

Hayward, District Attorney, 48. 

Hill, Alfred G. Kansas and Its Prohibition 
Enforcement, 133-6. 

Hobart, Hon. George S. Volstead Act, The 
85-101. 

Home-brewing, dealers in apparatus for, 140. 

Human Element in Prohibition Enforce¬ 
ment, The. T. Henry Walnut, 201-7. 

Hunsberger, Ambrose. Practice of Pharmacy 
Under the Volstead Act, The, 179-92. 

Industries, standardized: failure of to supply 
wholesome drinking water, 175. 

Inherent Frailties of Prohibition. John 
Koren, 52-61. 

Intoxicating Liquor Bill (England), 212. 

Intoxication, interpretation of state of, 11. 

Jessup, Henry W. State Rights and Prohibi¬ 
tion, 62-6. 

Justice, Department of, power of, 201. 

Kansas and Its Prohibition Enforcement. 
Alfred G. Hill, 133-6. 

Kelley, Florence. Laborers in Heat and in 
Heavy Industries, 175-8. 

Koren, John. Inherent Frailties of Prohibi¬ 
tion, 52-61. 

Kramer, John F., 101. 

Labor: German development of legislation, 
297-9; German legislation before war, 296; 
German new legislation, 296-7; specialized, 
108; danger of untrained, 108. 

Laborer, antagonism of toward rich, 31. 

Laborers in Heat and in Heavy Industries. 
Florence Kelley, 175-8. 

Law: future effectiveness of, 127, 128; serious¬ 
ness of defiance of, 126. 

Leacock, Dr. Steven, 84. 

League of Nations, Opium Committee of, pro¬ 
posals of U. S., 147. 

Legislation, right of, 62. 

Leverhulme, Lord, 114. 

Licenses, issued (Canada), 240. 

Licensing Board, work of Boston, 121. 

Life Extension Institute: percentage of defec¬ 
tives shown, 4. 

Life insurance companies, experience of, 6; 
testimony of, 2. 

Light wines and beer: amount consumed 
(France, Germany), 99; existing conditions 
in Europe, 12. 

Lincoln, Abraham, 161. 

Lincoln and Inaugural address, 62. 

Lincoln, Abraham, and Dred Scott Case, 72. 

Liquor: amount consumed in foreign countries, 
145; compensation fund (England), 272; 
early licensing laws (England), 265, 266; 


Index 


323 


effect of war on (England), 272-4; English 
interests in, 158; European interests in aroused, 
160; evasion, dangers to police in gathering 
evidence of, 199; first legislative restriction 
on sale of (England), 265; illicit sale of in 
Massachusetts, 122; influence of on strikes, 
131; international traffic in, effect of strong, 
208; lumbermen and use of, 129; miners and, 
129; (England) 19th century history, 267; 
political appointments and, 162, 163; politics 
and, 131, 155; (England) present restrictions 
as to sale of, 268, 269; (England) “Private 
Members” Bills, 275-277; (England) recent 
legislation (Scotland local veto), 274, 275; 
small amount of good available, 124; smug¬ 
gling problem, 149, 150; (England) sold in 
inns, 270; (England) “tied” vs. “free” 
house, 271; trust system applied to, 157; use 
of by aliens, 171. 

Liquor in International Trade. Wayne B. 
Wheeler, 145-54. 

Local Option: (Canada), 235, 236; in New 
Jersey, 76. 

Machine methods: in crude iron and steel in¬ 
dustries, 104-6; in foundries and shops, 
106-8; in use of coal and coke mining, 103, 104. 

Mechanical inventions, changes necessary be¬ 
cause of, 102. 

Men, Machinery and Alcoholic Drink. 
Charles Reitell, 102-9. 

Mitchell, Wesley C., 291. 

Moonshine whisky, amount made, 137. 

Moral law, results of man-made, 40. 

Motor Company, Packard and Ford, 107. 

National Policy for Enforcement of Pro¬ 
hibition, A. Felix Frankfurter, 193-5. 

Newsholme, Sir Arthur, 124. 

Non-Effectiveness of the Volstead Act, 
The. Senator Walter E. Edge, 67-83. 

Notes About Prohibition from the Back¬ 
ground. Robert A. Woods, 121-8. 

Oakley, Imogen. Prohibition Law and the 
Political Machine, The, 165-74. 

Our Experiment in National Prohibition. 
What Progress Has It Made? W. H. 
Stay ton, 26-38. 

Pasha, H. E. Yehia Ibrahim, 219. 

Pay day (miners), 130. 

Pay days: (lumberman) monthly; effect of on 
liquor use, 129. 

Permits, issuance of whisky, 205. 

Personal liberty: definition of, 1; necessary 
curtailment of, 15; political propaganda, 

131. 

Philanthropists, hypocrisy of, 41. 


Pharmacy: advanced educational requirements 
in, 181; attempts to control liquor problem, 
185, 186; code of ethics for practice of, 180; 
practice of, early history, 179; efforts to es¬ 
tablish manufacturing plants, 182; Eighteenth 
Amendment and (see Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment), 184, 185; Eighteenth Amendment and; 
mushroom enterprises, 187; Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment and; red tape involved and results 
of, 189, 190; formation of national organiza¬ 
tions, 180; Philadelphia College of, 179; 
practice of regulating of, 180, 181; practice of; 
duties and responsibilities involved in, 183; 
retail field, 182, 183; “retail liquor dealers” 
license, 185; scientific contributions, 181; 
Eighteenth Amendment and, 184-190. 

Philosophy, abstract and moral, 39. 

Pinchot, Gifford. Why I Believe in Enforc¬ 
ing the Prohibition Laws, 284-5. 

Pittsburg Survey; work of, 176; work of “water 
boys,” 177. 

Police Officer’s Difficulties in Enforcing 
Liquor Laws, The. Lynn G. Adams, 
196-200. 

Politics: enemy of business, 291. 

Politics in the Enforcement of the Liquor 
Laws. Arthur Capper, 155-64. 

Potter, Albert E., 112. 

Powderly, Mr. Terrence V., 84. 

Practice of Pharmacy Under the Volstead 
Act, The. Ambrose Hunsberger, 179-92. 

Priest, Hon. Henry S. Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment an Infringement of Liberty, The, 39-47. 

Prohibition. Rev. Floyd W. Tomkins, 15-25. 

Prohibition Law and the Political Machine, 
The. Imogen B. Oakley, 165-74. 

Prohibition: agents, 204; battle of enforcement, 
53; benefits of, 29; bootleggers as violators of, 
202; Canada, 230; Canada, efforts toward 
national, 226; Canada, enactment of provin¬ 
cial, 226, 227; Canada, Moderation League, 
224; Canada, present position of, 227, 228; 
Canada, use in, 225; combative efforts against, 
148; conditions since, 58; (Canada) constitu¬ 
tional difficulties, 232; cost of enforcement, 
37; (Canada) crime and drugs, 250-1; cul¬ 
mination of continous effort, 193; (Canada) 
difficulties of enforcement, 239; disregard of, 
65; disregard of after war, 167; early attempts, 
27; effects of (social, employment, education), 
130-1; effect of education of, 262-4; effect of 
on international standing, 35-7; endorsement 
of by railroads. Ill; enforcement, difficulty of 
in homes, 141; enforcement problem, 141-3; 
enforcing of in Pennsylvania, 284; English 
attitude toward, 124; evolution of in United 
States, 209; experiment of in United States, 
208; evils of, 30-3; factors in establishing 
national, 159; first Provincial Laws of, 234; 


324 


The Annals of the American Academy 


home movement since, 125; improvement in 
family and economic conditions since, 124, 
125; inferior type of enforcement agent, 169, 
170; (Canada) influence of war on, 238; in 
Hawaii, 98; justification for evasion of, 122; 
Kansas and federal, 133; Kansas drastic en¬ 
forcement of, 134, 135; Kansas; federal; re¬ 
sults in since, 134; Kansas, foreigners chief 
violators of, 135; in Kansas, 133; labor attitude 
toward, 125; lawlessness since, 60-1; legisla¬ 
tion and, 63; Massachusetts and New Jersey 
survey, 87-9; measures for in Europe, 146; 
measures used by opponents to, 159; misdirec¬ 
ted use of force, 52,53; obstacle to, 132;Pinchot, 
Government and Enforcement Problem, 142; 
political methods of opponents, 162; political 
issue, 55, 56; political value of state director 
of, 205; prior to World War, 26; progress made 
toward enforcement of, 121; progress toward 
in other countries, 209-22; prospect for world, 
224; provision of substitute drinks, 175; 
purpose of not accomplished, 27-9; (Canada) 
reasons for success of, 236; relation of war to 
national, 201; representative citizen evading, 
122; present results of, 13; state defiance of, 
54; states for, 97-8; state rights vs. federal, 
64; state vs. national, 26; steady growth of, 
166; suggestions as to enforcement of, 150, 
151; testimony of hospitals, 123, 124; testi¬ 
mony of social workers, 123; world war impe¬ 
tus to, 167; statistics; worthlessness of, 59; 
weaknesses of 57, 58; what surveys for show, 
115-9; worth of, 15. 

Prohibition in Canada. Cyril D. Boyce, 
225-9. 

Prohibitory Legislation in Canada. B. H. 
Spence, 230-64. 

Reed, Senator, 165. 

Reitell, Charles. Men, Machinery and Al- 
cohlic Drink, 102-9. 

Relationship of Alcohol to Society and to 
Citizenship, The. Eugene Lyman Fisk, 1-14. 

Retail Liquor Dealers Association, 202, 203. 

Roosevelt, Theodore, 157. 

Russell, Rev. Howard H., 279. 

Saloon: disappearance of, 86; (lumbermen and 
miners) social center, 130; menace of, 15; 
non-return of made possible, 78; political 
meeting in, 157; power of, 166; resort of evil, 
126; (Canada) substitutes for, 259. 

Saloon keepers, business of, 204. 

Selective Service Act, 201. 

Senate Judiciary Committee, political methods 
of brewers shown by, 157, 158. 

Slavery issue, 63. 

Socialist leaders (Germany), 296. 

Socialists, German efforts of, 299-301. 


Spenc i, B. H. Prohibitory Legislation in 
Canada, 230-64. 

Spence, F. S., 230. 

State Rights and Prohibition. Henry W. 
Jessup, 62-6. 

States, vs. federal rights, 194. 

Stayton, W. H. Our Experiment in National 
Prohibition. What Progress Has It Made? 
26-38. 

Statistics, misleading, 70-1. 

Sterling-Lehlbach Bill, 172. 

Stiles, T. D. Comments on Prohibition by a 
Lumberman and Miner, 129-32. 

Stock Market, 293. 

Supreme Court: decisions, 42, 43; test case 
before, 143. 

Swedish Law pertaining to liquor, 78. 

Taft, Chief Justice, 100. 

Temperance: beginning of organized movement 
(Canada), 231; beginning of, 39; early, 52; in 
Great Britain, 277; obstacles, 277. 

Till, Mr. Case of (England), 270. 

Tomkins, Rev. Floyd W. Prohibition, 15-25. 

Tousson, Prince Omar, 219. 

Treaty of Versailles, Germany and, 302. 

Vice vs. crime, 40. 

Violators of law, representative element among, 
73. 

Volstead Act, The. Hon. George S. Hobart, 
85-101. 

Volstead Act: action of Congress, 82; amend¬ 
ment to, 165, 166; antagonism of public to, 
203; consequences seen from, 78; contentions 
in regard to, 68-71; discriminating element of, 
46; effectiveness of, 85; expenditures for en¬ 
forcement of, 80; fair test of, 85, 86; incon¬ 
sistencies in, 80; modification of, 143; original, 
165; passing of, 202; remedy for existing con¬ 
ditions, 72; result of failure to enforce, 67, 68; 
revised, 78; specific objection to, 91; type of 
agents, 46; vetoed by senators, 72; why 
passed, 67. 

Walnut, T. Henry. Human Element in Pro¬ 
hibition Enforcement, The, 201-7. 

Washington, Conditions in, 81. 

Washington Conference of the International 
Labor Organization, Germany at, 303. 

What’s Wrong with the Eighteenth Amend¬ 
ment? Fabian Franklin, 48-51. 

W heeler, M ayne B. Liquor in International 
Law, 145-54. 

Whisky Insurrection-1794, 156. 

Whisky Ring, 156. 

YV hy I Believe in Enforcing the Prohibition 
Laws. Gifford Pinchot, 284-5. 

Wine-making, increase in home, 138. 

Women’s Christian Temperance Union, 39, 279. 


Index 


325 



Woods, Robert A. Notes about Prohibition 
from the Background, 121-8. 

Workers’ Courts, creation of in Germany, 

304. 



Workingmen, demand for some kind of drink, 178. 
World-Wide Progress Toward Prohibition 
Legislation. Ernest H. Cherrington, 
208-24. 














































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RT. HON. ARTHUR J. BALFOUR, M.P. 
London, England 


DR. M, J. BONN 
Berlin, Germany 

PROF. EDWIN CANNAN, LL.D. 
Oxford? England 

PROF. L. DUPRIEZ 
^^^tJmversity 

PROF. CARLO F. FERRARIS 
Royal University, Padua, Italy 

EDMUND J. JAMES, Ph.D., LL.D. 
University of Illinois 

PROF. RAPHAEL GEORGES LEVY 
Paris, France 


PROF. L. OPPENHEIM 

University of Cambridge, England \ 

PROF. A. C. PIGOU 

University of Cambridge, England 

ADOLFO G. POSADA 
Madrid, Spain 

DR. WM. E. RAPPARD 
Geneva, Switzerland 

GUILLERMO SUBERCASEAUX 
Santiago, Chile 

SR. DR. MANUEL VILLARAN 
Lima, Peru 

HARTLEY WITHERS 

. 

London, England 

SR. DR. ESTANISLAO S. ZEBALLOS 
Buenos Aires, Argentina 

G. F. PEARCE 

Melbourne, Australia 


DR. FRIDTJOF NANSEN 
Lysaker den, Norway 


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